What role does GMD play in ozone monitoring?
The Earth System Research Laboratory’s (ESRL) Global Monitoring Division (GMD), part of NOAA’s Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research (OAR), traces its roots in ozone monitoring back to the U.S. Weather Bureau and its measurements of total column ozone as part of the International Geophysical Year (IGY), 1957. W.D. Komhyr established the U.S. Dobson network in its current form with well-characterized and calibrated instruments and standardized operating procedures in the early 1960s. The NOAA/ESRL/GMD Cooperative Dobson network of 16 stations (including five sites within the continental U.S., one in Hawaii, and another at the South Pole with data records of nearly forty years in length) observes the total atmospheric ozone column using ground-based Dobson spectrophotometers. The instruments are regularly calibrated against World Standard Dobson No. 83 maintained by GMD and provide a very stable observational record well suited for determining long-term changes in ozone. The World S
