diff --git a/ci/create_run_xml_from_template.bash b/ci/create_run_xml_from_template.bash
index 664e626..5e76f4d 100755
--- a/ci/create_run_xml_from_template.bash
+++ b/ci/create_run_xml_from_template.bash
@@ -27,10 +27,17 @@ done
 popd
 
 #define env
-export DEV=/gpfs/f5/cefi/scratch
-export SCRATCH=/gpfs/f5/cefi/scratch
+if [ "$#" -eq 1 ]; then
+    export ACCOUNT="$1"
+else
+    # If no ACCOUNT provided, set to default value
+    export ACCOUNT="cefi"
+fi
+export DEV=/gpfs/f5/${ACCOUNT}/scratch
+export SCRATCH=/gpfs/f5/${ACCOUNT}/scratch
 
 echo "Current date: " $CURRENT_DATE
+echo "ACCOUNT: " $ACCOUNT
 echo "DEV: " $DEV
 echo "SCRATCH: " $SCRATCH
 echo "MOM6 tag: " $hash_MOM6
@@ -63,6 +70,7 @@ cat ocean_ice_cobalt_experiments.template.xml | sed -e "s/<FMS_GIT_HASH>/$hash_F
 						    -e "s|<MOM6_BRANCH_NAME>|$MOM6_BRANCH_NAME|g" \
 						    -e "s|<OBGC_BRANCH_NAME>|$OBGC_BRANCH_NAME|g" \
 					            -e "s/<CURRENT_DATE>/$CURRENT_DATE/g" \
+						    -e "s/<ACCOUNT>/$ACCOUNT/g" \
                                                     > ocean_ice_cobalt_experiments.xml
 
 
diff --git a/ci/ocean_ice_cobalt_experiments.template.xml b/ci/ocean_ice_cobalt_experiments.template.xml
index 121f2fb..f4e94f7 100644
--- a/ci/ocean_ice_cobalt_experiments.template.xml
+++ b/ci/ocean_ice_cobalt_experiments.template.xml
@@ -42,7 +42,7 @@ frecheck -I NWA12_COBALT_V1_1x0m2d_1646x1o,ocean_ice_cobalt_experiments.xml  -x
   <property name="OBGC_BRANCH_NAME"      value="<OBGC_BRANCH_NAME>"/>   <!-- git branch for OBGC source code -->
 
   <!-- Please make sure to change "YOURGROUPLETTER" to your group, such as b, f, g, m, o... -->
-  <property name="NCRC_GROUP"     value="cefi"/><!-- Replace YOURGROUPLETTER with GFDL group letter -->
+	  <property name="NCRC_GROUP"     value="<ACCOUNT>"/><!-- Replace YOURGROUPLETTER with GFDL group letter -->
   <!--Production run properties. Users can modify these according to their need and/or performance analysis-->
   <property name="PROD_SIMTIME"   value="1"/>