Transcript (SCOOP) will facilitate the assimilation of observational data into

SOUTHEASTERN
COASTAL OCEAN
OBSERVING
PROGRAM (SCOOP):
A STATUS REPORT
SURA BOARD OF
TRUSTEES MEETING
NOVEMBER 5, 2002
SURA’s Southeastern Coastal
Ocean Observing Program
(SCOOP) will facilitate the
assimilation of observational
data into community models
and provide a distributed
data ingestion and support
grid with broad band
connectivity. This is expected
to become a coastal
counterpart to the Global
Ocean Data Assimilation
Experiment (GODAE) with
emphasis on the southeast. To
launch the initiative, $ 1 M
for SCOOP is in the Defense
budget and another $ 1 m is
expected from NOAA.
Three Overarching Principles for Coastal Observing Programs
1. A national coastal observing program will necessarily
consist of regional and sub-regional components.
2. National, regional and sub-regional observing
systems must consist of three interconnected aspects:
(i) spatially distributed sensor arrays; (ii) data
management and dissemination hubs; and (iii)
nowcasting and forecasting models that are fused
with assimilated observational data.
3. The creation and long-term viability of nested
integrated and sustained coastal observing systems
will depend on a high level of interagency
coordination.
In the National Context
was created in 2000 to serve as the National Office for
Integrated and Sustained Ocean Observations (IOOS).
In March, 2002, Ocean.US hosted a week-long workshop on
creating an IOOS backbone for the U.S. Two reports from
that workshop may be accessed at the Ocean. US website
www.oceans.us.net
Proposed initial budget for
implementation of IOOS
• New GOOS resources for global climate change: $ 30 M
• Data communications and management system: $ 18 M
• Enhance existing observing elements (buoys etc.): $ 40 M
• Regional“proof of concept” observing systems: $ 50 M
• Total for IOOS initiation:
$ 138 M
Estimated total annual operating budget for IOOS: $ 500 M
For details: www.oceans.us.net
National Science Foundation
Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI)
• Cabled regional observatories
• Relocatable deep sea observatories
• Coastal observatories
In relation to the regional observatories
theme but intersecting the coastal theme,
NSF is promoting a program for creation
of Scientific Cabled Observatories
for Time Series (SCOTS). The budget
for this MRE program is expected to
exceed $130 M.
It is not the intent of SCOOP to create
another observatory. SCOOP is about
providing the IT infrastructure to integrate
the observing systems that now exist, or will
soon exist, in the Southeast, promoting the
effective and rapid fusion of observed data
with numerical models, and facilitating the
rapid dissemination of information to
operational, scientific and lay users.
OPERATIONAL APPLICATIONS
Theme: Predicting Hazards in Coastal Waters
1) Planning for port development;
2) Providing real-time “now casts” of wave, current and water
level information to ship and boat operators;
3) Supporting the offshore oil and gas industry;
4) Providing early warnings of harmful algal blooms;
5) Projecting the likely trajectories of oil spills;
6) Assisting Coast Guard search and rescue;
7) Predicting storm-surges;
8) Assisting homeland security
Cross-Cutting Coastal Scientific Issues
1.) How do the Coastal Ocean and atmosphere
interact on synoptic scales during storms and
on longer time scales and how do sediment,
nutrient and pollutant fluxes respond to
storms?
2.) In what ways and to what degree does the
ubiquitous presence of river-supplied
buoyancy, nutrients, sediments and toxins in
the Coastal Ocean impact or modulate the
physics, chemistry, biology and geology of the
system?
SPECIFIC COASTAL SCIENCE ISSUES
• Turbulence, water column mixing and vertical fluxes
• Seabed and bottom boundary layer dynamics
• Air-sea interaction
• Decadal effects of climate change
• Upwelling and downwelling processes.
• Transformation of surface and internal waves
• Dynamics and biogeochemistry of river plumes
• Nutrient cycling, water quality and oxygen dynamics
SCOOP
Phase 1 will involve:
(1) a data/computational
grid;
(2) interconnected community
modeling;
(3) assimilating data from
existing and emerging
observatories into models;
and
(4) broad-band dissemination
of data and model results
to scientific and
operational users.
The key word describing Phase 1 of SCOOP is integration.
Phase 1 will demonstrate integration among:
(1) SURA universities and federal labs;
(2) geographically distributed observatories; and
(3) various marine science sub disciplines.
A SURA IT framework will provide the skeleton and
community models will serve as the “glue” for this
spatial and interdisciplinary integration.