Bhubaneswar: A weather station was inaugurated at the Bakul Library in Satyanagar, Bhubaneswar today by Ms Chithra Arumugam, Principal Secretary, Science and Technology Department and Special Secretary, Planning and Convergence Department, Govt of Odisha, in which she also heads the SDG Cell.
The weather station was installed by the U.S. Consulate General, Hyderabad in partnership with the Bronx Community College of the City University of New York (CUNY) in the US.
Prof Neal Phillip, Chairperson of the Department of Chemistry, Earth Sciences and Environmental Sciences, Bronx Community College of CUNY, who installed the weather station along with Prof Paramita Sen, informed the young volunteers of BAKUL about its features and how it could be used.
The data from the weather station will be accessible to the public, to heighten awareness on the significance of climate data and climate change. It will help monitor micro-climate parameters like temperature, air-pollution levels, air quality, humidity, solar radiation, ultraviolet rays, wind and precipitation among others in the city. This data will be available online for anyone, anywhere to access it.
Mr Salil Kader of the U.S. Consulate said that they had already installed weather stations in XIM and Sri Sri Universities, and were also going to install them at SOA and KIIT Universities. They set up weather stations at Universities, which had Departments on Climate Sciences or Sustainability. Bakul Library, was not an academic institution unlike the others. But because Bakul worked with children and youth from different backgrounds, the weather station at Bakul had a lot of potential in educating large and diverse groups of young people.
Ms Chithra Arumugam was appreciative of the network formed between Bakul Foundation, the US Consulate and the College in the US and said that science thrives when institutions network. She said that she was excited by the possibilities that the weather station presented to develop a scientific temper in children and youth, and proposed to Bakul to help create 100 little projects on climate science around the Weather Station involving students of schools and colleges and offered all support from her side either from the Science and Technology Department or the SDG Cell. She also suggested designing internships for young people in which they take up climate science and climate action projects because climate change was real, and climate action was urgent.
Sujit Mahapatra of Bakul Foundation informed everyone that Bakul had already created a group of young climate enthusiasts, who were keen on using the weather station for active climate monitoring, and who would mentor and educate school and college children on climate change with the help of the weather station.
Before the inauguration of the weather station, there was a Quiz on Climate Change conducted by Bivash Rath and Mukti Pradhan of the Odisha Quiz Association and the young curious minds participating in the Quiz and the discussion on Climate Change, also were thrilled to get an exposure to the working of a weather station.
