CMOS Congress 2026 / SCMO Congrès 2026
Welcome to the Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society (CMOS) 60th Congress
The 60th Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society (CMOS) Congress will be held virtually from June 1-4, 2026.
The Theme of the Congress is “Navigating Uncertainty”. The need to characterize and quantify uncertainty of measurements, forecasts and projections is a unifying feature of all aspects of atmospheric, ocean, and climate science. Political and economic uncertainties also influence how research is done and used.
The Congress will bring together researchers from across the atmosphere, ocean, and climate sciences to discuss monitoring, mitigating, and managing these uncertainties, featuring virtual plenary presentations and scientific sessions addressing both research and operations.
Keynote Speakers
The best speakers in the field will be gathered during the event.
Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter FRS OBE is Emeritus Professor of Statistics at the University of Cambridge. He is a regular media commentator on statistical issues, and was very busy over the Covid crisis. His bestselling book, The Art of Statistics, was published in 2019, and The Art of Uncertainty in 2024. His career highlights include appearing on Desert Island Discs in 2022, and in 2011 coming 7th in an episode of BBC1’s Winter Wipeout. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 2005, awarded an OBE in 2006, and knighted in 2014 for services to medical statistics. He was President of the Royal Statistical Society for 2017-2018, and has been a Non-Executive Director of the UK Statistics Authority since 2020.
Dr. Claudie Beaulieu is an Associate Professor in the Ocean Sciences Department at the University of California Santa Cruz where she leads the Ocean and Climate Data Science Lab. She earned a Ph.D. in Water Sciences from the INRS Eau Terre Environnement research centre in Quebec and conducted postdoctoral research in the Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences Program at Princeton University. Before joining the UCSC faculty, she was a lecturer in the School of Ocean and Earth Science at the University of Southampton. She is a recipient of the prestigious CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation to support her integrated research and education program, leveraging data science techniques to gain insights on climate change
Dr. Christopher Subich is a Research Scientist in the Meteorological Research Division of Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC), where he has worked since 2012. His research focuses on atmospheric numerical weather prediction, specializing in both the application of artificial intelligence to global forecasting and high-order numerical methods for geophysical fluid dynamics. Recently, his work has centered on bridging the gap between machine learning and operational meteorology through the development of sharpness-preserving loss functions and AI-guided spectral nudging systems. He holds a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from the University of Waterloo and currently serves as an Associate Editor for Monthly Weather Review and Atmosphere-Ocean.
Katharine Hayhoe is an atmospheric scientist who studies how climate change impacts us and how we can effectively respond. She is globally recognized as a United Nations Champion of the Earth and an Oxfam Sister of the Planet, and has been named to TIME’s 100 Most Influential People, Foreign Policy’s 100 Leading Global Thinkers, and FORTUNE’s World’s Greatest Leaders.
Katharine is known for her ability to translate complex climate issues into accessible public discourse. She publishes a weekly Talking Climate newsletter, hosted the PBS Digital Series, Global Weirding, and writes for broad range of outlets, from TIME to Good Housekeeping. Her TED talk, “The most important thing you can do to fight climate change: talk about it” has more than 4 million views and her most recent book is “Saving Us: A Climate Scientist’s Case for Hope and Healing in a Divided World.”
Currently, she is the Chief Scientist for Nature United (The Nature Conservancy) and holds the positions of Horn Distinguished Professor and the Political Science Endowed Professor in Public Policy and Public Law at Texas Tech University. Katharine earned her B.Sc. in Physics from the University of Toronto and her M.S. and Ph.D. in Atmospheric Science from the University of Illinois. She is a fellow of the American Geophysical Union, the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, the Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society, and the American Scientific Affiliation, and serves on advisory boards for organizations such as Netflix, UBS, and the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. In recognition of her contributions to science communication and engagement, she has received a number of awards and four honorary doctorates.
Behind the Scenes of Planning the 2026 Congress
This section outlines some of the considerations that led to the major changes in the format of this conference, as well as some of the challenges that come with them. It is our desire that this information helps you understand that this year’s conference will be seen as a showcase for potential innovations in the field of virtual conferences. This is a step toward more long-term planning for the organization of our annual Congress.
The Flash talks will proceed as follows: each speaker will have a maximum of 5 minutes for their presentation. Once all presentations are complete, a group question-and-answer (Q&A) session will take place, with no predefined order. Those wishing to ask a question must first indicate in the chat box which speaker they are addressing. As a general guideline, approximately 2 minutes of Q&A time is allocated per presentation within the total duration of this collective Q&A session.
The story behind the Flash talk in a Congres: At the last two in-person congresses, PICO-F (meaning Intensive and Short Presentation for Francophone Speakers) has invited Francophones and Francophiles to participate in a 180-second Flash talk competition (with judges). This is a way to promote scientific presentations in French and subsequently serves as a social event for Francophone and Francophile scientists attending the congress. PICO-F is the inspiration behind the 5-minute Flash talks at this congress. Incidentally, this short and concise format for delivering scientific presentations at virtual conferences is currently booming worldwide.
Fourwaves is a new platform we’re testing this year. Compared to the one we used previously, it gives us more control and flexibility over the content and layout of the interactive website for our Congress.
That said, even though Fourwaves is relatively easy to navigate, it still takes some time to learn how to upload content. You will likely see traces of this ongoing learning process in the first edition of our Congress on Fourwaves, and don’t be surprised to see changes to the website in the coming days, including those related to the Congress. This is all part of navigating uncertainty!
Thank you for your patience!
A virtual congress should be viewed as an event spanning several half-days and covering multiple time zones across Canada and internationally. Furthermore, due to its virtual nature, participants’ visual and cognitive fatigue must be taken into account when organizing such an event.
For this congress, the usual time slot for an in-person congress was largely maintained, but it begins at 8:00 AM in the Pacific Time Zone and ends around 6:00 PM in Newfoundland and Labrador.
To offer a scientific program with a number of presentations comparable to an in-person congress within a 5-hour window (11:00 AM-4:00 PM EDT) per day, the congress organizing committee quickly concluded that it was necessary to shorten the standard session blocks of an in-person congress program. The parallel sessions section features 60-minute oral blocks (instead of 90 minutes) with oral presentations shortened to 12 minutes (instead of 15 minutes) and, finally, we added the Flash talks (see the article dedicated to them).
We hope you enjoy this first edition as we work to find the ideal format for our future virtual congress.
Location
Online event:
Contact us
If you have any questions, please contact exec-dir@cmos.ca