Mission
History of DKRZ
In 1987, a national climate computing centre, DKRZ, was established in Germany as a central service facility to meet the rapidly growing computational demands of the climate research community. It evolved from the joint computer center of the Max-Planck-Institute for Meteorology (MPIM) and the University of Hamburg. DKRZ was organised as a non-profit limited company (gemeinnützige GmbH). Its first scientific director was Klaus Hasselmann, also director at MPIM, the first technical director was Wolfgang Sell. Major investments for the facility were provided by the BMBF. The operations were funded jointly by BMBF and the company’s shareholders, the Max-Planck-Society for the Advancement of Sciences, the University of Hamburg, the GKSS Research Centre and the Alfred-Wegener-Institute for Polar and Marine Research. During its first decade, DKRZ's staff grew from initially 12 to 55 including some personnel funded by research grants.
Around the year 2000, DKRZ was significantly restructured for organisational and financial reasons. The teams involved in specific model support and in data support were separated from DKRZ and administered under the name "Model and Data" by the MPI-M in Hamburg. DKRZ and its remaining staff members concentrated on the operation of the supercomputing facility and the associated services. Guy Brasseur was appointed as a new director at MPIM and as the new scientific director of DKRZ.
In 2009 and 2010, further significant changes took place. As an important step to better integrate DKRZ into the scientific landscape, the new director (Thomas Ludwig) was appointed. At the same time, he was also appointed full professor for computer science at the University of Hamburg. DKRZ moved into a new building funded by the City of Hamburg, and the Model & Data group was re-integrated. Today, DKRZ has about 60 staff members and is structured into four departments: Application, Data management, Systems and Administration.
