Grant Firl is a Research Scientist II (more specifically, an Atmospheric Physics Development and Implementation Research Scientist) with the CSU/CIRA at NOAA GSL, contributing to the Common Community Physics Package (CCPP) project at the DTC.
Grant was the foundational developer of the CCPP Single-Column Model (SCM). He wrote and documented the entire SCM from scratch, which required the scientific understanding of how an SCM works and the technical skill to code in both Fortran and Python. He then connected several datasets to the SCM, and made it work with the international SCM format (Development and Evaluation of Physics in atmospheric models, DEPHY, v0), opening the doors for CCPP SCM users to tap into a vast library of cases. Grant also conducted code management for the SCM, keeping it up to date with the CCPP Physics and Framework main branches. He also developed the initial implementation of the UFS Replay capability. The CCPP SCM is now widely used in the community, making it a foundational tool for physics development and a handy tool for teaching NWP.
While Grant often works independently, he is also known as a great team player and is always happy to help the DTC team and the wider community. He has a great work ethic and always steps forward to help. In addition to the CCPP SCM development and support, Grant works in other DTC tasks, all within the CCPP project. For example, he was the committee chair for the CCPP Visioning Workshop that took place in August 2023. In September 2023, Grant received the CSU/CIRA’s Exceptional Service Award in recognition of "his instrumental planning and execution of the recent three-day CCPP Visioning Workshop." Grant also co-manages the root CCPP Physics repository and the UFS fork of CCPP Physics. He is deeply knowledgeable about all things CCPP, including the Framework, and has contributed significantly to project plans, discussions with DTC and external colleagues, and provided a great deal of support to the community via tutorials, online materials, and Q&A.
Thank you, Grant, for all the work you do for DTC!
