Sanja Perica

Sanja Perica is a senior research environmental scientist at RTI. She has over 30 years of experience researching and teaching various water resource engineering related topics. Currently, Dr. Perica serves as the Chief Scientist for the NOAA Atlas 15 project. Atlas 15 is a tool used for climate change prediction and adaption, including extreme precipitation. In this role, she provides team leadership and guides scientific and technical research. She manages the day-to-day tasking of RTI staff for the expansion of scientific analysis and development of the project’s precipitation frequency estimates. 

NOAA Atlas 15 project task includes the following:

• Applying modern statistical methods that account for trends in historical data and future climate conditions for development of precipitation frequency estimates
• Evaluating and processing climate modeling projection data
• Creating a quality controlled national extreme precipitation data repository

Before joining RTI in 2023, Dr. Perica served as a faculty member at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Utah. She was also the Director of NOAA/NWS/Hydrometeorological Design Studies Center (HDSC) and the Technical Lead for the NOAA Atlas 14 Volumes 4 to 11 projects and the Atlas 15 Prototype project.