The primary purpose of the Unidata Community Equipment Awards is to encourage new members from diverse disciplinary backgrounds in the geosciences to join the Unidata community, and for existing members to continue their active participation so as to enhance the community process. We will accept equipment proposals from academic institutions engaged in teaching and research in the geosciences for the deployment of Unidata-supported systems.

It is the intent of this award program to assist institutions wishing to participate actively in the Unidata community; to assist those who have participated actively in the past but need system upgrades to meet the standards currently recommended for deploying Unidata systems; and to assist organizations from disciplines outside of the atmospheric community who can provide and support important and relevant datasets and tools to the Unidata community at no cost.

Small institutions, institutions that have not previously submitted proposals to this program, and institutions outside Unidata's traditional atmospheric sciences community are especially encouraged to apply.

Brief History

For many years the National Science Foundation (NSF) administered the Unidata Equipment Awards program, which was initially developed to assist smaller universities with becoming part of the Unidata community. In 2001, NSF decided that the program had become too expensive for them to administer, so with encouragement from the Policy Committee and User Committee Unidata proposed to take over the administration of the Equipment Awards. This included assembling a panel of community members to review proposals and make recommendations regarding funding. NSF granted approval and in 2003 Unidata ran the first competitive process (click here to view the 2008 Call for Proposals). Each year Unidata is committed to setting aside money from core funds to continue the Equipment Awards program.

2003 Awardees

Click on the proposal links to view the Equipment Award report.