23 April
2006 - The Hon Greg Hunt MP, Parliamentary Secretary
with ministerial responsibility for the Australian
Bureau of Meteorology today congratulated Mr Laurie
Porter, a Bureau technical officer with the Cape
Grim Baseline Air Pollution Station, Tasmania,
as a recipient of the prestigious United States
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(NOAA) Environmental Heroes Award.
The Environmental Heroes Award
is given to individuals and organisations each
year from across the United States and around
the world and is presented in conjunction with
Earth Day celebrations on 22 April. The award
honours those working with NOAA for their "tireless
efforts to preserve and protect our environment".
Overall, there are ten recipients of the Environmental
Heroes Award in 2006.
Mr Hunt said that Laurie's role
in the Bureau is impressive, having arrived at
Cape Grim in late 1983 after being a well respected
instructor for Bureau engineering technical officers,
and now being considered a leading international
expert in greenhouse gas instrumentation.
“That Laurie is the only non-US
citizen out of the ten well deserved recipients
of this year's award makes his award an exceptional
achievement.”
“Laurie's dedication and work
effort at the Cape Grim station was first recognised
through the awarding of a National Australia Day
Achievement Medallion in 2002 from the Department
of the Environment and Heritage”.
“The NOAA Carbon Cycle Greenhouse
Gas flask sampling that started in 1984 and NOAA
Halocarbon and other Atmospheric Trace gas Species
program that started in 1991 are two of the many
collaborative programs at Cape Grim that tie Australian
data into the world network of greenhouse gas
observations. Laurie has been involved in those
NOAA programs since their inception at Cape Grim.”
“The Cape Grim station celebrated
its 30th anniversary last week and is managed
by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology with a
research partnership with CSIRO. It has been a
major success story in Australia's efforts to
monitor greenhouse gases. Laurie Porter has been
a major contributor to that program for the past
23 years.” Mr Hunt said.
“This latest award showed that
the outputs of the Cape Grim collaboration between
the Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO were highly
respected in the international community”.
“Well done to Laurie Porter,
all the people who have been part of the Cape
Grim for the last three decades, and all the recipients
of this year's NOAA Environmental Heroes Awards.”
