diff --git a/backup_database.sh b/backup_database.sh
index ec6a957..891b414 100755
--- a/backup_database.sh
+++ b/backup_database.sh
@@ -1,5 +1,8 @@
 #!/bin/bash
 
+# Set PATH for cron compatibility - cron has a very limited PATH, .local contains AWS CLI
+export PATH="/usr/local/bin:/home/ubuntu/.local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:$PATH"
+
 # This backup script creates nightly database and media file backups of the BuildingSync website when running
 # in a docker container. The name of the container running the database is hardcoded to look for
 # *db-postgres*. This may cause an issue if several docker applications are running on the same
@@ -8,36 +11,98 @@
 # To create nightly backups, add the following to your crontab
 # 0 0 * * * /srv/buildingsync-website/backup_database.sh <db_name> <db_username> >> /home/ubuntu/buildingsync-website-backups/cron.log 2>&1
 
-DB_NAME=$1
-DB_USERNAME=$2
+# Test with the crontab entry -- should run every minute
+# * * * * * /srv/buildingsync-website/backup_database.sh  buildingsync-website buildingsync-website >> /home/ubuntu/buildingsync-website-backups/cron.log 2>&1
 
-function file_name(){
-    echo ${BACKUP_DIR}/${DB_NAME}_$(date '+%Y%m%d_%H%M%S').dump
-}
+# Source environment variables if the file exists, will read in s3_bucket and PWs as needed
+if [ -f /etc/profile.d/buildingsync.sh ]; then
+    source /etc/profile.d/buildingsync.sh
+fi
 
-function media_file_name(){
-    echo /backup/dir/${DB_NAME}_media_$(date '+%Y%m%d_%H%M%S').tgz
-}
+DB_NAME=$1
+DB_USERNAME=$2
+S3_BUCKET=${S3_BUCKET:-"nrel-aws-buildings-backups"}
 
 if [[ (-z ${DB_NAME}) || (-z ${DB_USERNAME}) ]] ; then
     echo "Expecting command to be of form ./backup_database.sh <db_name> <db_username>"
     exit 1
 fi
 
+if [ -z ${S3_BUCKET} ]; then
+    echo "S3_BUCKET is not set"
+    echo "[ERROR]-S3_BUCKET-not-configured"
+    exit 1
+fi
+
+# Check if AWS CLI is installed
+if ! command -v aws &> /dev/null; then
+    echo "AWS CLI is not installed or not in PATH"
+    echo "[ERROR]-AWS-CLI-not-found"
+    echo "To install AWS CLI:"
+    echo "  curl 'https://awscli.amazonaws.com/awscli-exe-linux-x86_64.zip' -o 'awscliv2.zip'"
+    echo "  unzip awscliv2.zip"
+    echo "  sudo ./aws/install"
+    exit 1
+fi
+
 # currently the backup directory is hard coded
 BACKUP_DIR=/home/ubuntu/buildingsync-website-backups
 mkdir -p ${BACKUP_DIR}
 
+# get the run date to save as the s3 folder name
+RUN_DATE=$(date +%Y-%m-%d)
+
+function file_name(){
+    echo ${BACKUP_DIR}/${DB_NAME}_$(date '+%Y%m%d_%H%M%S').dump
+}
+
+function media_file_name(){
+    echo ${BACKUP_DIR}/${DB_NAME}_media_$(date '+%Y%m%d_%H%M%S').tgz
+}
+
 # db_password is set from the environment variables in docker-compose. The docker stack must
 # be running for this command to work.
-echo "docker exec $(docker ps -f "name=buildingsyncwebsite_db-postgres" --format "{{.ID}}") pg_dump -U ${DB_USERNAME} -Fc ${DB_NAME} > $(file_name)"
-docker exec $(docker ps -f "name=buildingsyncwebsite_db-postgres" --format "{{.ID}}") pg_dump -U ${DB_USERNAME} -Fc ${DB_NAME} > $(file_name)
+echo "docker exec $(docker ps -f "name=buildingsync-website-db-postgres-1" --format "{{.ID}}") pg_dump -U ${DB_USERNAME} -Fc ${DB_NAME} > $(file_name)"
+docker exec $(docker ps -f "name=buildingsync-website-db-postgres-1" --format "{{.ID}}") pg_dump -U ${DB_USERNAME} -Fc ${DB_NAME} > $(file_name)
 
 # Backup the media directory (uploads, especially buildingsync). In docker-land this is
 # just a container volume, so create a new container with the volume attached and tar it up.
-echo "docker run --rm -it -v buildingsync_media:/backup/media -v $BACKUP_DIR:/backup/dir/ alpine:3.8 tar zcvf $(media_file_name) /backup/media"
-docker run --rm -v buildingsync_media:/backup/media -v $BACKUP_DIR:/backup/dir/ alpine:3.8 tar zcvf $(media_file_name) /backup/media
+MEDIA_BACKUP_FILE=$(media_file_name)
+MEDIA_BACKUP_BASENAME=$(basename "$MEDIA_BACKUP_FILE")
+# Run as the current user to avoid ownership issues, ubuntu:ubuntu
+CURRENT_UID=$(id -u)
+CURRENT_GID=$(id -g)
+echo "docker run --rm --user $CURRENT_UID:$CURRENT_GID -v buildingsync_media:/backup/media -v $BACKUP_DIR:/backup/dir/ alpine:3.19 tar zcvf /backup/dir/$MEDIA_BACKUP_BASENAME /backup/media"
+docker run --rm --user $CURRENT_UID:$CURRENT_GID -v buildingsync_media:/backup/media -v $BACKUP_DIR:/backup/dir/ alpine:3.19 tar zcvf /backup/dir/$MEDIA_BACKUP_BASENAME /backup/media
 
 # Delete files older than 30 days.
 find ${BACKUP_DIR} -mtime +30 -type f -name '*.dump' -delete
 find ${BACKUP_DIR} -mtime +30 -type f -name '*.tgz' -delete
+
+# upload to s3
+for file in "$BACKUP_DIR"/*.dump
+do
+  echo "Backing up $file to $S3_BUCKET/buildingsync-website/$RUN_DATE/"
+  if [ ! -s "$file" ]; then
+    # the file is empty, send an error
+    echo "[ERROR]-PostgreSQL-backup-file-was-empty-or-missing"
+  else
+    # can't pass spaces to slack notifications, for now
+    aws s3 cp "$file" "s3://$S3_BUCKET/buildingsync-website/$RUN_DATE/"
+    echo "[SUCCESS]-PostgreSQL-uploaded-to-s3://$S3_BUCKET/buildingsync-website/$RUN_DATE/$(basename "$file")"
+  fi
+done
+
+for file in "$BACKUP_DIR"/*.tgz
+do
+  echo "Backing up $file to $S3_BUCKET/buildingsync-website/$RUN_DATE/"
+
+  if [ ! -s "$file" ]; then
+    # the file is empty, send an error
+    echo "[ERROR]-Mediadata-backup-file-was-empty-or-missing"
+  else
+    # can't pass spaces to slack notifications, for now
+    aws s3 cp "$file" "s3://$S3_BUCKET/buildingsync-website/$RUN_DATE/"
+    echo "[SUCCESS]-Mediadata-uploaded-to-s3://$S3_BUCKET/buildingsync-website/$RUN_DATE/$(basename "$file")"
+  fi
+done