William Capehart

Brief Bio

I am an Associate Professor in Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences & Civil and Environmental Engineering at the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology. I received my M.S. and Ph.D. in Meteorology from Penn State and my B.S. in Atmospheric Sciences from the The University of North Carolina at Asheville. Currently at SDSMT I am the program director of the Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences Program and I do research in hydrometeorology, forecast risk assessment and climate change.

Research Expertise

My research interests are the remote sensing and modeling of surface features and land-surface processes with emphasis on applications in operational meteorology, risk and hazard assessment, numerical weather and regional climate prediction, and land-surface hydrology. In particular, I am interested in developing tools to examine the role of land cover, vegetation and subsurface processes on the hydrologic cycle. Much of my work in this area involves modeling of hydrologic processes in the soil, on the land surface (runoff and stream flow) and below the surface, as well as the impact of the transfers of moisture and heat between surface and atmosphere (and the subsequent feedbacks at the weather and climate scales). Additionally, I am involved in scientific visualization in the geosciences and engineering, as well as investigating the applicability of GRID- based technologies towards hydrometeorological problem domains.

Teaching

My teaching specialities revolve around numerical weather prediction, boundary layer meteorology, numerical methods and environmental modeling. I've also taught courses in climate science, remote sensing and synoptic meteorology. We are currently developing courses on hydro-climatatology and also one on natural hazards.