Paul Douglas (meteorologist)

Paul Douglas is the stage name^[1] of Douglas Paul Kruhoeffer (born June 12, 1958),^[2] a meteorologist, author, and entrepreneur in Minneapolis-St.Paul, Minnesota. He has over 30 years of broadcast television and radio experience.^[1]

For other people with the same name, see Paul Douglas.

Early life and education

Douglas Kruhoeffer was raised in Pennsylvania.^[3] His hometown is Lancaster, Pennsylvania.^[1] While in high school, he began using the stage name Paul Douglas.^[1] He graduated from Pennsylvania State University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Meteorology in 1980.^[4]

Career

Broadcasting and journalism

While a senior in college, he began broadcasting the weekend weather reports for WNEP-TV in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and then after he graduated, he moved to weekdays.^[1] He worked for Satellite News Channel, based in Stamford, Connecticut, from 1982 to 1983.^[4] This was followed by a move to Minneapolis, Minnesota, where he worked at KARE (formerly WTCN-TV and WUSA) from 1983 to 1994.^[4] He was a weatherman in Chicago at WBBM-TV for three years^[5][3] before returning to Minneapolis where he worked at WCCO-TV from December 1997 until he was laid off in April 2008 as part of nationwide cutbacks by station owner CBS.^[6][5]

Douglas wrote a daily weather column for the Star Tribune from 1997 until his replacement by the WCCO-TV weather team in February 2009. He provided forecasts for three local radio stations. He has been a reporter for the Twin Cities Public Television show Almanac.

In 2009, the St. Cloud Times appointed him as the head of their meteorological team^[7][8] and Conservation Minnesota partnered with him to create MNWeatherCenter,^[9] a hub for Minnesota weather.

In 2010, the Star Tribune rehired him as a weather blogger.^[10]

Businessman

Douglas leads a number of companies that he founded or co-founded, including WeatherNation (as CEO), Broadcast Weather (as CEO) and Smart Energy (as President).^[11] In 2007, he co-founded SingularLogic LLC, a patent holding company, and he founded Broadcast Weather and NoozMe LLC, which hoped to capitalize on SingularLogic's patents.^[12]

He founded EarthWatch Communications in 1990, which created weather visualizations for the feature films Jurassic Park and Twister.^[3] He made a cameo appearance in a weather center scene in the latter. He co-founded Digital Cyclone in 1998^[3] which created weather applications and supplies content for wireless devices under the My-Cast brand name. Douglas sold Digital Cyclone to Garmin^[3] in 2007 for $45 million.^[13]

Author, educator and speaker

Douglas regularly writes and speaks about global warming and is critical of those who say that it is not occurring or is not caused by human actions.^[14]

Douglas has authored two books, Prairie Skies: The Minnesota Weather Book (1992, ISBN 9780896582088) and Restless Skies (2004, ISBN 0760761132).^[15]

He has taught broadcast meteorology courses at Saint Cloud State University.^[1]

Personal life

Paul Douglas and his wife have at least two sons, Brett and Walt.^[3]