‘Climate City™’

In 1951, the Federal Government moved all weather records to Asheville, North Carolina, where the archives at the U.S. Weather Bureau, Air Force, and Navy combined to form the National Weather Records Center (NWRC).

In Asheville, the Federal Government was already using one of the largest buildings in the South, the Grove Arcade. It was a desirable location to house millions of pages of weather observations and a rapidly expanding database of computer punch cards. Asheville was also relatively isolated and inland thereby protecting these critical records from both foreign enemy attack, and hurricanes, which were more likely to impact coastal locations.

The organization was incorporated, with all civil weather entities, as part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in 1970. That same year, the NWRC changed its name to the National Climatic Center. In 1982, 12 years later, the organization was renamed the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC). The National Climatic Data Center moved into its current location, the Veach-Baley Federal Building, a block from the Grove Arcade, in 1995.

In 2015, NOAA consolidated three data centers to create the National Centers for Environmental Information, with the Asheville facility serving as headquarters and managing data from the bottom of the ocean to the surface of the sun.

The Collider launched in 2016 with the opening of its headquarters in downtown Asheville, North Carolina — also known as Climate City™.