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Dear OceanPredict Team,
I like very much this idea of a global program to reinforce coastal ocean prediction. It is a stirring project and gives strong motivation to contribute.
I will personally support and promote this great initiative at the OceanGliders program level.
Sustained and planned coastal and offshore ocean observations will be one of the key of the success of this program. Gliders, associated with other platforms, could highly contribute to the design of a future Global Coastal Ocean Observing System.
Looking forward to participate to this inspiring scientific adventure.
Best,
Victor Turpin – Technical Coordinator of the OceanGliders program at JCOMMOPS
Dear Victor, gliders are the perfect monitoring system for the global ocean predictions, going across the shelf, connecting the shores with the open ocean and completely relocatable. Looking forward to work with the glider community even more than in the past.
The coastal ocean is the place where ships load/unload freights and passengers; it is where they bunker and can produce significative emissions of both GHG and harmful pollutants, and where they can use energy from shore. Cabotage occurs along the coastal ocean. Furthermore, ships may anchor near the coast instead of berthing at ports. Finally, the coastal ocean is also the place where the maximum vessel traffic density and related hazards are. There is no maritime transport without a coastal ocean.
I would consider adding:
1. Predicting plastics transport, fouling, decay and sinking in coastal zones and adjacent open waters.
2. Pharmaceutical (emerging persistent pollutants) terrestrial transport and fate in the coastal zone.
3. The effects of increasing seawater desalination at multiple locations on coastal zone ecosystems and dynamics.
4. Pathogenic bacteria survival and development of antibiotic resistance in coastal zones.
Dear Jacob,
your points should be inserted as soon as possible as they are key pollution issues to be solved with an integrated coastal ocean prediction system! Thanks for having suggested them, we will keep focus on them as soon as we will revise with you the document.
Today people forecast the weather. What is needed in the face of a changing climate, are forecasts of the impact of that weather. As climate change makes weather increasingly erratic, the ability to quickly and accurately predict and prepare becomes ever more crucial. To answer specific questions about how property owners and communities can thrive in the face of extreme weather events of the future and rising sea levels a better understanding of the dynamics of the urban ocean is necessary.
The urban ocean is the place where the ocean, the land, and the people all come together. Each of these component “systems” has a profound effect on the others. The tide creates complex dynamics, often in the context of an estuary environment, that influence the physical, chemical, and biological characteristics of the region and thereby define its capability and capacity to support human life. The coastal ocean and weather patterns drive processes and events that range from highly supportive of human populations to highly threatening. This balancing act between ocean-as-sustainer and ocean-as-threat has produced a very wide range of coastal ocean “management” strategies that have themselves often resulted in significant short and long-term changes to the balance.
Governments, asset owners, and water resource managers need a better, clearer understanding of climate-change-related risk to assess the probable impacts of multiple perils. These perils may be water-related like storm surge, sea-level rise, extreme precipitation, and drought as well as other perils that impact critical infrastructure, including extreme heat and cold, wind, wildfires, snow and hail. Large enterprises are now adopting advanced climate risk modeling of impacts to their critical infrastructure. Here we need to understand the force of water – hydrodynamics – where the uniqueness of the urban ocean, and the influence and impact of temporal and spatial variations, ranging from seasonal to millennial, are key, and to understand the force of the city – urban design – where the influence and impact of human interactions, e.g., through land degradation, river management, and other anthropogenic activities, dominate. Technology and data are changing the game in climate risk management and this in turn can change the game in flood risk mitigationin the urban ocean.
Suggested reading: The Urban Ocean by Blumberg and Bruno, Cambridge University Press.
Dear Alan,
it is an honor to have your insight. We all learn from your “urban ocean” vision and this is a big part of the Decade Challenge. Hoping to work with you in the Decade to increase our understanding and applications for meeting the UN Decade targets.
Thank you for his great initiative.
The scope and key objectives are clear. Still, I think that it might be interesting to put some more emphasis on aspects related to biological diversity (currently covered only in your SGD 14). In the same point you talk about “nature based solutions”, which is actually presented (further down) as the first proposed solution. Therefore, given that the discussion is largely about the goods and services offered by the coastal ecosystems, and further considering that proposed solutions and mitigation’s measures should be nature based or nature focused, I think that the document could benefit for a more throughout presentation/consideration of ecosystem / biodiversity aspects.
Thank you
Dear Antonios,
thanks for pointing out to this missing point which certainly needs consideration. We will add together soon
best regards
This program is an opportunity to reinforce the harmonization of the existing operational coastal forecasting systems, towards to support pollution environmental issues from the recently increase of coastal activities and the enlargement of coastal installations connected to oil/gas exploration and exploitation at regional seas, as for example in the Eastern Mediterranean sea.
dear George,
after twenty years of coastal modelling developments, some of which you were a leader of, I agree it is time to harmonize and finally understand how to monitor and control coastal pollution. Looking forward to go to this new step together
best regards
Thanks for giving me the opportunity to propose my idea, to me this is a more expensive kind of program.
Monitoring Coastal-Ecosystem and Hazards through the Application of the Next Generation’s Coupled Regional Coastal Ecosystem Model
In order to adapt to the future climate change, understanding and providing a quantitative framework by isolating the effects of individual climate parameters on coastal dynamics process, erosion, rising sea levels and sediment movement are needed to minimize future marine and coastal ecosystem risks. Regional Coastal-Ecosystem Downscaling Model (RCEDM) play important roles in assessing the potential effects of climate change on coastal ecosystems and developing management strategies aimed at minimizing risks to sensitive habitats, species, and people living along the coasts. Global warming is associated with significant the high-latitude amplification feedbacks. But how strong is the amplification? Will it be a slow increase or will it accelerate in the coming 20-100 years? This is currently unknown, despite 20 years of research. One of the problems is that most the high-latitude ocean processes feedbacks reside in the eddy resolving detail because of the high latitude nature of the problem with a small Rossby Radious of deformation. As a result, a super-high-resolution model is needed to capture eddy-resolution at high latitude zones. The high‐latitude’s cloud radiative feedback when coupled with the Ice-Albedo feedback is not adequately captured in the current coupled climate models, partly due to the coarse resolutions of both the atmosphere and ocean models that will fundamentally affect quantification of the high‐latitude amplification. The proposed model framework will permit a new transformative way of thinking about the climate feedbacks over the coastal areas of the higher and middle latitudes positive and negative. Furthermore, changes to the marine biota are known to involve oceanic oxygen and carbonate chemistry. This understanding is very essential to mitigate the impacts, thus reducing the risks towards the survival and adaptation of the coastal-oceanic ecosystems. However, considerable uncertainty in the projections of future climate change has led to the uncertainty in the projection of oxygen and carbonate chemistry. Increase of the air temperatures up to ~1.5 oC, due to global warming is enough to thaw permafrost faster than ever. This in itself can cause nutrients that have been trapped for thousands of years to be flushed into the sea surface much faster than ever before. In view of the above, implementing a super-regional coastal-ecosystem downscaling model is fundamental to resolve uncertainties of the coastal climate change in the higher and middle latitudes zones. Thus, the new coupled model which incorporates the coupling of Ocean-Atmosphere-SeaIce-Wave-Biogeochemical-Sediment is proposed to address both basic and novel questions at various spatiotemporal scales due to complexity of the ocean-biogeochemical and trace gases in response to the climate change and the consequent ocean-atmosphere interaction that affects future coastal and marine ecosystems. This model will also enable further probing of the changes in anoxia and organic matters that have yet to be investigated sufficiently in the changing climate.
It’s a great initiative. The interaction physical-biological-chemical processes is quite complex at the coastal region, which make it hard for accurately forecasting on temperature, salinity, currents, nutrients, phytoplankton, zooplankton, harmful algea etc. The program can help us to reveal the unknown coastal synanics, interaction processes and mechnism, and to reinforce coastal ocean forecasting. Definitely I support it.
Within the Science Ideas, bullets 6 and 7, I would suggest explicitly adding:
* multi-scale capability of data assimilation algorithms
to reconcile coastal and larger scales, including emerging two-way nesting data assimilation algorithms.
For the same bullet points that Andrea mentioned, it would be nice to have ‘methods using unstructured meshes’ too along with nesting and downscaling.
For 2nd point of “driving science ideas”, I suggest rephrasing to “The understanding of factors that affect the accuracy of and out limits on the predictability of …”. The reason is that costal oceans are impacted by both inshore and offshore forcing. The availability and accuracy of forcing impact prediction. The prediction of a perfect model can still be lousy if the forcing is wrong. The inshore forcing, from land and rivers, is in particularly difficult to get. Predicting river runoff requires good weather and hydrology prediction, as we discussed at COSS-TT meetings. Obtaining biogeochemical fluxes from inshore is even more challenging. The collaboration with land surface community will be important.
For the 1st point of “Solutions”, can “blue economy” be added, or its is already included in “blue carbon”? I am considering the fast growing aquaculture, which is influenced not only by water quality, but also physical parameters such as temperature, sea levels and currents. For example, fish may suffer “thermal shock”, other by heat waves and sudden cooling.
Two points for now. Thanks for initiating this project.
Good idea. The coastal seas are more tightly linked to society sustainable development and need more efforts to improve our ablity of prdicbility all of the world. Hope this program could stimulate more new technicks for auto-observation net and provide effective forecast system for envionroment variation.
It is a great idea to include the theme “Predicting the Global Coastal Ocean” as a topic within the “UN Ocean Decade Programme”. The topic deserves much attention.
An eminent issue in the coastal ocean zones is the (wish for) multifunctional use of the coastal space. Therefore, studies should be focusing also on the carrying capacity of the coastal system, in an economic, ecological and societal perspective, with regard to the transition of the coastal systems due to the increasing demands for energy supply, food production, traffic and safety. The aspects of the (economic, ecological and societal) carrying capacity of the coastal ocean, and a sustainable balance between those aspects, could be more emphasised in the programme (and as such added to the “Driving Science Ideas”, and also added as one of the “scientific questions”).
This would be a great opportunity to predict coastal ocean by integrating the systems along the Land-Ocean continuum.
One point I would like to shed light on is the coastal ocean carbon cycle, which is an important part of global carbon cycle but now has been increasingly affected by both anthropogenic perturbations and climate changes. The growing nutrient loadings by rivers into the coastal ocean have resulted in exacerbated eutrophication, which drives an enhanced sink of atmospheric CO2; on the other hand, eutrophication-induced hypoxia and ocean acidification have expanded to a larger extent in intensity and area, which might expose the coastal ocean to a higher risk of elevated productions of GHGs (e.g., CH4 and N2O), reduced biodiversity, shifts in community structures and negative impacts on food security and livelihoods. In addition, the coastal ocean would be affected by global climate change via the ocean margin-open ocean boundary with changes in SST, ocean circulations, and so forth. Coupled observations and modelling are needed for cross-system studies in order to predict the coastal ocean in changing future scenarios.
The idea of a Global Coastal Ocean program is an excellent one that holds particular relevance for the Netherlands. Many of the stressors of ocean health find their origin on land. To attain SDG14 depends also on addressing land-based SDGs, as is only natural for the UN 2030 agenda, which is integrated and undivisible. Solving the relation between land-based stressors, marine development and maintaining ocean health is nowhere more urgent than in the coastal oceans. I therefore wholeheartedly support this initiative.
I also support the initiative and I completely agree with the comment by Dr. Tom Kompier. Recently, in the Western Mediterranean, the storm Gloria evidenced the necessity of an integrated management of land, rivers and coasts. Thus, there is an urgent need to work together with researchers and managers of inland resources and environment.
Hi,
How does this effort engage/integrate with the transition of GODAE Ocean View (GOV) to OceanPredict in 2019, supporting many of the same objectives? OceanPredict (formerly GOV, https://www.godae-oceanview.org/) has a long-standing Coastal and Shelf Seas Task Team. Perhaps this is an opportunity to integrate/merge efforts to focus attention on these critical issues?
Dear Eric, absolutely – this is why Pierre and I are among the initial group proposing this activity.
Global Oceans Initiative – Deltares view
1 Coming decades of transitions
The coming decades the North Sea will see major changes in the use of marine space, driven by the energy transition, the change from wild catch to food cultivation, the necessity to protect our shores from sea level rise and the international drive to restore natural functions. These changes will take place against the background of global processes, such as climate change. This will result in changes in the food web and the general functioning of the North Sea ecosystem. Many of these functions and ecosystem services are competing with each other in terms of space and resources, such as nutrients, sediment and light. A thorough understanding of the fundamental processes driving the North Sea system, for which we still lack some basic knowledge, and its interactions with human use is essential to protect the North Sea as well as the human populations depending on her, from over exploitation and degradation.
2 Envisaged common approach
In order to enhance the (predictive) understanding of the North Sea Ecosystem, required to face the challenges of the coming decade and support policy decisions regarding sustainable use of the North Sea system, Deltares, Wageningen Marine Research and NIOZ have published a joint position paper . This document details our views regarding the best approach to gain more insight into the functioning of the North Sea system and our abilities to predict the consequences of climate change as well as changes in human use of the system.
3 Source-to-Sea
A fundamental aspect is the integrated Ecosystem-based Management approach which focusses on the carrying capacity of the coastal system in an economic, ecological and societal perspective, in order to understand and predict the increasing demand by human use. We support the concept of a Global Coastal Ocean because it also underpins another aspect of our approach, the Source-to-Sea concept. Source-to-Sea includes all land-based and transitional waters activities and how it impacts coastal and marine waters, since an estimated 80 per cent of the sources of marine pollution are from land-based sources. An integrated source-to-sea approach is essential to protect the marine environment.
Other coastal waters face similar challenges. We strongly believe that the general approach detailed in the position paper “Understanding the North Sea Ecosystem”, advocating a strong integration of measuring, monitoring and modelling, is applicable to other systems as well. We strongly support initiatives for integrative programmes geared towards understanding and sustainable management of our global coastal systems.
ref: Herman, P.M. J., J. Asjes, H. Hummel, R. Jak, J. C. Kromkamp, H.J. Lindeboom, K. Soetaert, T.A. Troost, J. Van der Meer, J. Van der Molen, K. Van de Wolfshaar, L. A. Van Duren and T. Van Kooten. 2019. “Understanding the North Sea Ecosystem.” Delft: Deltares. Report nr. I1000486-000-OA-005
UN Ocean Decade Programme “Predicting the Global Coastal Ocean”
coastspredict.org
It is an excellent programme and although identified atleast a decade late, since much damage has already been made but its never too late to correct our mistakes of a century.
I have one observation … who is the custodian / owner / driver of this Global Coastal Ocean Programme. Is it UNEP, Regional Seas Programme (UNEP-RSP) or UNCSD, or FAO or CBD or UNFCCC or any other UN organization or any non UN organization. Without identifying this driver, it will be difficult to steer its progress. It looks like a cabinet without Prime Minister / President.
In addition, identification of key major international players / stakeholders including UN organizations need to be identified and made them part of the governing body to run this programme. There would be a complete agenda & yearly plan for such a needful programme. This central body would have than regional bodies with regional players. Organizations like ICLEI, C40, Ocean Health Index, high seas alliance, Stockholm Env Instt, Wilson, Coastal cities municipalities etc may be involved.
Real issue is linking educational/research institutes & syllabuses to be showing current uptodate scientific information and new generation of scientist / engineers need to feel the heat of ocean related issues. The syllabuses needs to be updated after every 5 years. Ocean relating issues (including deep sea mining, marine biodiversity loss, extensive overfishing, sea water quality eg. chemicals, pesticides, heavy metals, mercury etc parameters to be tested, Presence of Nitrogen/ Phosphorus in coastal marine water, rising ocean temperatures, rising acidification, coral reef issues, extensive shipping, sea level rises, marine carbon offsets, ocean & coastal sustainability concerns etc )– all issues damaging / harming oceans directly or indirectly needs to be added / updated after every 5 years to educate/ train our new experts to address these issues. This section needs to be part of the programme.
Separate Technical / implementation /financial teams need to be establish at international / regional / local / Regional Seas Programme for each of the above mentioned critical issue with independent Plan of Action.
Overseeing mechanism (for example controlling overfishing, using small sized nets, killing fish with explosives, / chemicals etc need to be checked/ controlled using satellites, citizen science, every possible technological support) also needs to be established. Currently no mechanism exist to control the carnage (The Cove – documentary, Dutch butchering dolphins, Whales being killed under disguise of research, Multi Nationals going for net fishing etc) as have been observed in the past 2-3 decades.
Increasing Marine Protected Areas MPAs numbers & areas (more geographical coverage) and its effective management and providing legal coverage of these MPA in the international courts and considering the violations as Environmental crimes against humanity.
These are some of my humble observations.
This is a great initiative and framework for a multidisciplinary approach to the study of global coastal ocean.
We believe that such program could be beneficial not only in the context of modelling, through data assimilation, but also for the observational platforms through data blending techniques.
Moreover, this initiative with a combined numerical and observational approach can provide powerful tools for Marine Protected Area management at a local scale.
The comments above could be summarised in the following driving science ideas:
– The harmonization of multiplatform observing systems would be important for monitoring purposes, but also to develop methods to combine independent observations and reconstruct the 3-D coastal dynamics through data blending.
– The coordination among multidisciplinary observatories and numerical studies would contribute also to the understanding of bio-physical coupling processes which in turn can provide powerful tools to optimise protection measures at a local scale (e.g. Marine Protected Areas).
Thanks again for this great initiative
Annalis Griffa, Marcello Magaldi, Maristella Berta, Roberta Sciascia
Marine science researchers and sholars will surely appreciate your initiative. There have been discussions among practitioners on how to harmonize observations and QA/QC methodologies in a coordinated costal – deep sea system. The theme is present in your planning document and can be well developed by the participants.
This is a great time both for the researchers and the humans. As for predicting the ocean, I suggest that we scientist community pay more attention to the new technologies of “Machine Learning” which may happen to be a great innovation. Even reinforcement leanring, put our SOTA physical ocean models (ROMS, HYCOM…) as the rules and input the ocean circulation as the state, think about what will we get next… But maybe it will need extraordinary calculation resources to generate enough random actions…
Ocean study needs greater amout of funding than weather and climate because we cannot easily detect the deep ocean using the satellites. Hope someone close to the governors are able to well balance the input and output… Think about the great fires in Australia and arctic warming… Maybe we need to build dams to avoid coastal lines shrinking…
As an integrated, global scale efforts to improve our capacity in predicting the coastal ocean, Global Coastal Ocean Prediction is a key step towards next generation coastal ocean service for blue growth, public safety, climate change adaptation and ocean health. BOOS members have worked together in the past two decades to improve our knowledge and predictive capacity on the Baltic Sea system. Systematic monitoring of Baltic Sea in Denmark, Germany, Finland and Sweden started more than 100 years ago. Regional cooperation on climate change research, environmental protection and fishery management has been coordinated by Baltic Earth, HELCOM and ICES, respectively for more than two-decades. It is expected that the current predictive capacity (mainly on ocean-ice-wave-biogeochemical parameters) for synoptic scale will be extended to seamless (spatiotemporal) predictive capacity for the Baltic Earth System in 2030. Baltic Sea can be testbed in many key challenge areas, eg optimal design of coastal ocean observing system, especially for essential ocean biogeochemical and biological variables; integrated monitoring-modelling and operational ecology; integration between operational, environmental, ecological and climate monitoring and modelling communities.
A stronger-than-global average enhanced stratification (weaker winter convection) in the Northeastern Atlantic Ocean, and thus reduced nutrient supply to the productive sunlit zone, is projected to reduce the production of algae and marine animal biomass in this region during the next century. (point B5 in the IPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate ). Several model systems identify the NEA Ocean, as the potentially most predictable region in the World Oceans, and this could provide predictability for the adjacent shelves, and their ecosystems.
This is a great initiative for the global coastal ocean and is particularly welcomed for those countries which rely heavily on coastal marine resources.
Can I suggest incorporating the emerging field of next generation sequencing of environmental DNA (eDNA) in connection with big data and machine learning. eDNA is revolutionizing the way we study marine ecosystems and I believe that it will play an important role in future coastal observing systems addressing biodiversity, pathogen monitoring, marine fisheries and links between climate and ecosystem structure. Additionally, because it is based on water sampling, it is rapidly expanding the observational infrastructure available to study multiple trophic levels in coastal systems, including for example gliders, AUVs, fixed moorings, automated sampling devices and ships of opportunity, citizen science etc.
Thanks again for this great initiative and the opportunity to provide feedback.
Ian Salter, Faroese Marine Research Institute.
A stronger-than-global average enhanced stratification (weaker winter convection) in the Northeastern Atlantic Ocean, and thus reduced nutrient supply to the productive sunlit zone, is projected to reduce the production of algae and marine animal biomass in this region during the next century. (point B5 in the IPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate ). Several model systems identify the NEA Ocean, as the potentially most predictable region in the World Oceans, and this could provide predictability for the adjacent shelves, and their ecosystems
I offer a suggestion based on a specific numerical ocean model. But it might apply to other models.
Some years ago, I wrote a Guide on the use of the Princeton Ocean Model (POM). The Guide needs updating to include surface gravity waves, distinguishing between pressure and skin friction transfer, wave breaking in the surf zone, all features now in the model but not in the guide. I will begin updating the guide, but it should be augmented beyond my capacity as an individual. Therefore, I suggest that a team of, say, no more than five researchers be formed to 1) Assist in the writing and/or vetting of the core Guide. The Guide should include a discussion of the basic underlying theory plus a tutorial on implementation of the code. 2) A series of Problems, mostly well defined to illustrate specific ocean scenarios, and preferably where data is available. 3) Solutions to each Problem, hopefully where data is available.
Under 3) where data is not available, a recommendation for new data can and should be made.
Dear George,
thanks so much for your ideas. I believe I am talking on behalf of the large audience, we are honored and thrilled that your are with us.
A project on how to develop model manuals and community models based upon a series of problems and solutions for each problem is really a key to the success of the programme which should enhance our capacity to understand the coastal ocean and solve the problems and challenges.
We will be in touch soon,
best regards
Nadia
The Programmes ambitions to create an integrated system that bridges geographical and thematic divides is timely and important, and I fully support it. The outcomes from OceanObs’19 are a good indicator of the appetite within the community for a more coherent and integrated approach. It is important to move away from our traditional silos to a co-designed system for monitoring our oceans that includes, amongst others, observational scientists and modellers and allows us to work seamlessly in the global coastal regions in the same way we have increasingly become able to do so in the deeper oceans.
I imagine that one of the key challenges will be in working across boundaries. We must make best use of, and strengthen, the institutional structures already in place and support best-practice in regional/national coordination around the world if this is to work. I believe GOOS regional groups such as EuroGOOS and NOOS (in my region) and national coordination groups (for example the UK’s National Partnership for Ocean Prediction) are central to the success of this work and need to be engaged at an early stage. At the moment the Programme has some really exciting ideas and ambitions but to fully realise its potential I believe we need to have a vision of where we will be in 10 years, and how that will look different than it is now at a fundamental level. This concrete vision needs to be developed early in the process.
A very exciting initiative, and I look forward to getting involved.
We are pleased to see this initiative to focus specifically on the coastal ocean. Here at the Norwegian Meteorological Institute we run operational ocean and wave forecasts on a daily basis, and the following topics are particularly relevant:
1) improved description of land-ocean interactions with closer coupling between atmosphere, land surface and ocean model components,
2) efficient two-way nesting between high resolution fjord models and our coastal forecast model,
2) bringing in water quality elements in concurrence with EUs water framework directive,
3) assimilation of a larger variety and volume of data, including user observations,
4) developing impact-based forecast services using probabilistic information.
It’s very good to see that these topics are covered in your initiative and we wish you the best of luck with your efforts. Let us know how we can contribute.
Dear Coast-predict group,
The EuroGOOS Coastal Working Group strongly supports the programme Predicting The Global Coastal Ocean proposed in the framework of the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development and considers that they can actively contribute to its objectives.
The EuroGOOS Coastal Working Group (http://eurogoos.eu/coastal-wg/) aims to examine the entire value chain from coastal observations, satellite data, ocean forecasts and analysis to products and services for coastal users with a view to examining sustainability of the system, fitness for purpose of the existing system and future steps that the EuroGOOS community can take to secure and improve all elements of the coastal value chain. The EuroGOOS Coastal WG can actively contribute to the future “Global coastal ocean prediction” programme on themes related to the European Seas, especially the current status and future evolution of the European coastal ocean monitoring and modelling capacities; Sustainable European Ocean Observing System, EOOS; integration among satellite/in-situ monitoring, coastal ocean modelling and data assimilation, land-sea continuum, data management and facilitate the uptake of operational products by offshore and coastal economic actors (e.g., aquaculture, tourism, offshore energy, etc…); as well as future capacities on predicting ocean pollution, marine ecosystems, sediment transport, coastal flooding and coastal erosion, etc.
We consider that different activities already being launched by the EuroGOOS Coastal WG can contribute to the development of this Predicting The Global Coastal Ocean programme . In particular, an operational modelling inventory recently published in Frontiers in Marine Science journal (Capet et al., 2020) could serve as a basis to analyze the strengths, define gaps and propose recommendations and actions to improve the existing operational coastal modelling systems in Europe.
The EuroGOOS Coastal Working group is happy to build upon significant initiatives already completed or underway that have focused on coastal observing, modelling and provision of services. These include, but are not limited to, the work of JERICO-S3, DANUBIUS-RI, EMODnet, SeaDataNet, CLMS, and CMEMS-In Situ Thematic Centres (INS TACs), activities within other EuroGOOS working groups and observing platforms task teams and the five Regional Operational Oceanographic System (ROOS).
Looking forward to participating and looking for synergies with this promising initiative,
Ghada El Serafy and the rest of the EuroGOOS Coastal Working Group
Thank you for this necessary and timely initiative. From our experiences in AZTI, gathered from the operation and exploitation of EuskOOS (Basque Operational Oceanography System), in total connection with the other coastal areas of the Atlantic margin (IBIROOS), the active participation in different European projects dealing with the coastal zone and from collaborations within the European and Global HF Radar community, we would like to put some emphasis on the following aspects:
To provide innovative solutions based on enhanced scientific and operational collaboration and partnerships between coastal actors is really a challenge. Homogenization is a key element. Another is to find new innovative ways of community collaboration to foster the transfer of solutions to society and their effective replicability to other coastal areas. This implies the collaboration for the planning and development of cooperative coastal observing networks and/or modelling configurations and data assimilation systems, the transfer of tools fed by standardized data, and the work in multidisciplinary networks which should include both decision makers & scientific advisers). It is also important to be able to combine both the development of needed knowledge and infrastructures at local scales, with the vision of becoming key actors for the local stakeholders, and the building of a strong global coastal community of experts able to respond to questions that are common to all areas, like those arising in a context of global change.
Meanwhile progress is needed along the Land Open Ocean continuum (cross shore axe), the role of the alongshore processes in the coastal area should be deeply investigated. This alongshore component should also drive the design of multiplatform observing networks (HF and X-band radars, cross shore glider lines, consistent fixed platform networks, videometry for beach monitoring…) and the implementation of nested coastal modelling systems (with common assimilation capabilities), capable to offer the integrated high resolution data and simulations needed for a complete approach to the coastal processes.
The mission of the UK’s National Partnership for Ocean Prediction (oceanprediction.org) is to develop and promote marine products and services, with a focus on national and public benefit. We are a partnership made up of institutions delivering ocean prediction services and research in support of these services in the UK. Our focus is on the integration of models, observations and scientific understanding, and how these can be used to produce good quality information and advice about the marine environment.
Our mission is nicely encapsulated in the Programme suggestions, with the need to integrate models, observations and science understanding being important to deliver the best services to the public in a changing coastal-ocean environment as reflected throughout the programme text. We are therefore very supportive of the Programme’s ambitions and look forward to being able to contribute to its development and implementation. With regard to the programme’s scope we think it important that it:
1. Has the ambition to drive forward a transformative change in how we predict the coastal-ocean at global scales, bringing together the diverse scientific communities active in this context.
2. Embodies the concept of co-design of modelling and observation approaches
3. Acknowledges the need to support the underpinning modelling capability development needed to address the requirements of multiple sectors.
4. Incorporates both the natural science and human dimension aspects to this critical issue.
5. Considers how to engage national and regional groups, for example the GOOS regional alliances and National Partnerships such as ours, which are critical to building a global-coastal community to deliver the programme.
Dear Jason and John
thank you for your support to the initiative. The strategy that you are depicting is very much in line with the general idea of the programme and we will consider it very seriously building the case for having the Programme approved at the final UN decade Conference which will happen sometime this year.
Looking forward to work with you toward the goals
Best regards
As an atmospheric scientist and modeler I would like to propose emphasis to be given in coastal security from small scale phenomena like rip currents. Air sea exchange (e.g. sea salt) and effects in clouds and coastal effects (marine stratocumulus) are phenomena related to coastal management. close collaboration of ocean and atmospheric scientists. Congratulations for your initiative.
MONGOOS strongly support the Coast Predict initiative in the framework of the UN decade of Ocean Science for sustainable Development and considers that they can actively contribute to its objectives.
The Mediterranean Operational Network for the Global Ocean Observing System (MONGOOS) (http://www.mongoos.eu/) was established in 2012 to further develop Operational Oceanography in the Mediterranean Sea. The very well established modeling system, structured around Copernicus Marine Service, with numerous high-quality applications provide user-oriented services. The community has fostered its activities through an association of operational and Research Agencies implementing plans and prototype systems in the European coastal areas. MONGOOS is a GOOS Regional Alliance for the Mediterranean Sea since its formation.
MONGOOS can actively contribute to the “Global coastal ocean prediction” program on themes related to (i) gather Northern African Countries in the coastal observing systems; (ii) increase the level of collaboration and exploitation of synergies with the coast-predict group, AfricaGOOS and Black Sea GOOS; (iii) promote the transfer of knowledge in coastal prediction and observation systems that will end in cooperation among different countries, filling gaps and promote synergies between different regions, developing common practices for data analysis and QC and finally the integration of MONGOOS members to the Coastal Operational Oceanography systems.
We consider that different activities carried out in the frame of MONGOOS that include modelling, observations and downstream services in the Mediterranean Sea can contribute to the development of this GOOS coastal initiative. In particular, MONGOOS will promote the acquisition of sea level, T/S, Meteo, surface currents and wave data in the Mediterranean gap areas (including North Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean) as well as complete operational coastal models for specific needs.
Looking forward to participating and looking for synergies with this promising initiative.
Alejandro Orfila and Vanessa Cardin on behalf of MONGOOS community
Co-Chairs MONGOOS
Pretty much everything has been said but I hope I can add one point. The Subseasonal-to-Seasonal Forecast and Application activities under WCRP have reached a certain maturity now. The S2S applications provide a fantastic Ready-Set-Go framework for decision making from seasonal (Ready) to extended range (Set) and short/medium range (Go) timescales for coastal ocean applications. Coastal oceans don’t really have boundaries and yet all decisions on resources such as fisheries and environmental issues such as HABs and Pathogens are framed to be managed within national and EEZ boundaries. Regional Earth System prediction needs to be brought to global coastal oceans at S2S timescales where S2S timescales become critical for adaptive management and sustainability within the background of sea level rise and extreme events.
Dear Costs Predict team,
EMODnet Physics (www.emodnet-physics.eu) strongly support this initiative. EMODnet Physics (www.emodnet-physics.eu) is one of the seven domain-specific portals of the European Marine Observation and Data Network (EMODnet) marine-data initiative funded by the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund which, together with the Copernicus space programme and the Data Collection Framework for fisheries, are implementing the EU’s Marine Knowledge 2020 strategy.
Thanks to the support and contribution of several of the leading scientists (already supporting this initiative), the EMODnet-Physics map portal (www.emodnet-physics.eu/map) provides a point of access to datasets and products on physical parameters of the oceans. It integrates data and products structured around SeaDataNet and its network of National Oceanographic Data Centers, Copernicus Marine Enviromental Monitoring Service – In Situ Thematic Assembly Center, Permanent Service for Mean Sea Level Monitoring (PSMSL) and Global Sea Level Observing System (GLOSS), International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES), Joint Technical Commission for Oceanography and Marine Meteorology in situ Observations Programme Support Centre, operational networks from GOOS Regional Alliances, and many others.
The available themes (http://erddap.emodnet-physics.eu; http://thredds.emodnet-physics.eu; http://geoserver.emodnet-physics.eu), are temperature of the water column, salinity of the water column, horizontal velocity of the water column, sea level and sea level trends, wave height and period, wind and atmospheric pressure, optical properties (e.g. light attenuation, back scattering, turbidity, etc.), other biogeochemical data (e.g. chlorophyll, dissolved oxygen, etc.), sea-ice coverage. Lately, with actions on underwater sound pressure level (acoustic pollution), and river runoff the focus was moved from open waters to coastal waters where land, hydrology, ocean and atmosphere interact in a multiplicity of space and time scales. This interaction has to be studied by a holistic approach that involves serveral expertises, and EMODnet Physics has already made avaialble products on river runoff flow, total suspended matter concentration, water acoustic pollution, but it is not enough yet.
For this reasons, EMODnet Physics will keep developing initiatives for data sharing, data harmonization, data fusion and offering support to ingest new data and help new data providers to share their data and expertise and it is looking forward to proactively contribute to this inspiring initiative.
Antonio Novellino
EMODnet Physics coordinator
The prediction needs observations for coastal ocean modelling and data assimilation. An increasing request of data is coming from any public and private sector of the society to build for the future. High technology marine industries, but also governmental entities, depend upon increasingly data to design structures, operations, and for ocean and climate research. Due to the presence of a vast bulk of ocean data archived in personal computers or local databases inaccessible by external users, they should be unlocked to be used to support the sustainable development of initiatives like EMODnet.
Data rescue and availability should be an item, largely encouraged in the recent years, running parallel to the continuous monitoring in coastal and open ocean. This should be strongly stimulated further also inside the different Ocean Networks operating worldwide.
This is a great international global initiative. It is useful to bring together the many places that are prone for flooding due to sea level rise and storm surges where regional coastal prediction systems, as well as organizations to address adaptation and resilience issues were established, such as the Institute for Coastal Adaptation and Resilience (ICAR) in our university (https://oduadaptationandresilience.org/). I just wonder if this initiative involves mostly ocean scientists, or will attract also others from the coastal engineering community, emergency managers, policy makers, etc. For example, for our region we organize Flood Adaptation Forums (https://sites.wp.odu.edu/HRAdaptationForum/) that bring together scientists, engineers, city planners, resilience officers, etc., so the science will have an immediate impact.
This is a great community effort!
Appreciate your hard work! Thank you!
I would definitely support George’s suggestion (https://www.coastpredict.org/your-comments/#comment-33). And along John’s line of thought (https://www.coastpredict.org/your-comments/#comment-34), specifically, waves are an integral part of the `entire’ system and we need a standard community practice, not one that works only within wave modeling community! Also those that could be shared across models, observations for adoption in DA world and global systems in O( 10 years?).
Another comment is reg satellite data near coasts. For e.g., is there any plan or is someone (or groups) involved in improving current microwave retrievals say within 10km of coastline (which is typically thrown away in current processing chain)?
[Pardon my ignorance if such folks are already involved]
Hi Nadia and all,
I hope you are coping well in Italy during this crazy time.
I very much agree with Tal Ezer’s comment that the proposed UN Program should serve as a platform to bring scientists, engineers, economists, policy makers and coastal managers together to ensure a successful outcome. My work (see references below) shows that Coastal oceanography is responding to new challenges, but so far very few studying management and conservation strategies or offering policy solutions. Further, as your document has correctly identified, coastal research is very much of inter-disciplinary nature and requires close collaboration of scientists from Hydrology, Oceanography (physics/biology/chemistry), Coastal engineering, Atmospheric science, and Environmental management/Social science. However, vigorous and systematic multi-disciplinary funding mechanisms are still lacking everywhere, thus hindering its research rate of progress. This must be addressed by the proposed Program. International and multi-lateral collaboration is also critical so that regional problems/experiences can be shared and scaled up for international audience/applications. Finally, as we have discussed previously, while we develop coastal ocean prediction capability, open and shared regional/coastal ocean database must also be developed so that integration of science and management can be seamless, and international/regional collaborations can be encouraged and carried out.
Regards,
Hua
Wang, X.H., Y.-K Cho, X. Guo, C.-R. Wu, J. Zhou, 2015, The status of coastal oceanography in heavily impacted Yellow and East China Sea: Past trends, progress, and possible futures, Estuarine, Coastal and Shelf Science. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecss.2015.05.039.
It is indeed a very interesting initiative. Ideas and proposals concerning at least the Mediterranean. One of the best studied seas in the world. A geographic area that forecasts say will undergo significant changes by 2050. The Mediterranean coastal zone is a highly charged system. Both from the densely populated provincial cities and from the pressures of shipping and tourism. I believe that a point of view of actions should turn to comparing research results of modern times with earlier periods, but following the same technology of earlier times. By selecting geographical areas with minimal anthropogenic pressure where benthic diversity surveys were conducted in the 1970s and 1980s, repeating the same protocols in the same areas would yield a vast amount of information and knowledge about changes in space and time.
Dear Nadia, Dear All,
This is an excellent initiative for global coastal ocean science. I found that most has been said already. Here is my two cents. As always, lying at the heart is how to make the forecasts more accurate. So prediction and predictability for processes on different scales are pivotal. Will it be necessary to emphasize the development of new methodologies to improve the technical components such as data assimilation, model initialization, open boundary specification, to name a few? For example, an application of the newly developed rigorous causality analysis (Liang 2014) combined with machine learning to coastal ocean forecasts proves to be promising. I did find in the draft document items on the improvement of sub-seasonal to seasonal predictions and multiscale interaction studies. Maybe this could be incorporated into them. (Or should we have it explicitly listed?)
Best regards,
San
PS.
X.S. Liang 2014: Unraveling the cause-effect relation between time series. Phys. Rev. E, 90, 052150.
X.S. Liang 2016: Canonical transfer and multiscale energetics for primitive and quasi-geostrophic equations. J. Atmos. Sci., 73, 4439-4468.
Dear Global Coastal Ocean Starting Group
Thank you for this initiative to highlight coastal oceans, which as you’ve pointed out – and I strongly agree with – has lagged behind open ocean oceanography and yet is such plays such an important role in billions of people in coastal communities directly and more people indirectly. As an archipelagic nation, the Philippines is surrounded by coastal waters and is affected by coastal processes and is dependent on them for a multitude of things.
I would suggest “Sustainable Mariculture and Capture Fisheries” – not just mariculture. Although mariculture is definitely important especially as its contribution is growing, capture fisheries is still a significant for food security.
We also consider harmful algal blooms as a hazard since this can be an increasing threat to mariculture and fisheries in a more polluted and changing climate.
I would also suggest exploring innovations on low-cost/affordable observational tools, and promoting strong community partnerships/engagements and capacity-building that are critical for the success of observational programs in developing country settings.
Dear all,
I am answering on behalf of Shom on this programme and we hope that these elements will be useful and thank you for this action on coastal oceanography.
Three points seem important to us to be clarified or analysed in the programme.
Observing system: it would be desirable to move towards high frequency and a spatial coverage in adequation with the need for all the sensors measuring EOVs and to improve and imagine sensors to achievethe issues of the open boundary model forcing or coupling / validation / calibration / assimilation of circulation models, hydrodynamic-sedimentary or biogeochemical..
Improve modelling with adequate assimilation techniques: need to specify the objective: to predict the ocean in the short and medium term for risk management for example, and in the long term for climate studies on the other hand. Moreover, the solutions should not be only predictive. Real time and deferred time requirements are also required as required.
Concerning EOVs (Essential Ocean Variables): it would be desirable to have a reflection on EOVs and derived variables (variable associated with the vortex / frontal dynamics, coherent Langrangian structures for example).
Dear all,
I also strongly encourage that this initiative could integrate Bio-EOVs as phytoplankton and harmful algal blooms. I can contribute to it. Thanks.
A couple of references:
Anderson, C.R. et al. 2019. Scaling Up from Regional Case Studies to a Global Harmful Algal Bloom Observing System. Frontiers in Marine Systems 6:250. doi: 10.3389/fmars.2019.00250.
Berdalet, E. et al. 2017. GlobalHAB – Global Harmful Algal Blooms, Science and Implementation Plan. SCOR and IOC, Delaware and Paris, 64. pp. http://www.glohab.info/.
The conceptual idea of a ‘global coastal ocean’ is indeed timely and relevant. With almost 40% of earth’s population living within 100 km of the coast, it is great to recognize that there is an urgent need for a better understanding coastal processes, how they impact humans and how human activity is changing the coastal ocean. However, the call to action cannot be just more of the status quo – i.e. doing more what we as scientists currently do. We have to change our modes of observing the coast and seize new technologies as appropriate. So for example, while gliders are now thought of as cutting edge platforms for measuring physical and biogeochemical variables, our challenge is not merely adding more glider lines but to think hard about how to add new sensors and how these assets are deployed smartly. In addition, other mature technologies including small satellites (SmallSats), unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), autonomous surface vehicles (ASVs) and (propelled) autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs), and animal-based sensing tied together with recent and established advances in embedded machine intelligence and machine learning (ML) need to be included in the arsenal of observational tools.
In addition to the advances in observational modes, we also have to think about how the observational and modeling outputs are integrated and synthesized for the multitude of stakeholders.
We are a small group of inter-disciplinary collaborators hailing from operational biological and physical oceanography, as well as marine robotics, space science and Artificial Intelligence across Portugal, Spain and the United States. Our aim is to impact the science and societal needs through the advancement of our research in coastal marine robotics.
• Fossum et. al “Toward adaptive robotic sampling of phytoplankton in the coastal ocean” Science robotics. vol. 4 (27). 2019
• Costa et. al ” Field Report: Exploring Fronts with Multiple Robots”. Proceedings 2018 IEEE 0E5 Autonomous Underwater Vehicles 2018
• Fossum et. al “Information-driven robotic sampling in the coastal ocean.” Journal of Field Robotics. vol. 35 (7).2018
• Ferreira et. al ” Advancing multi-vehicle deployments in oceanographic field experiments”. Autonomous Robots Journal 10.1007/s10514-018-9810-x 2018
• Guerra et. al ” On small satellites for oceanography: A survey” Acta Astronautica. vol. 127. 2016
• Sousa et. al “Integrated monitoring of Mola mola behaviour in space and time” PLOS ONE. vol. 11 (8). 2016
—signed (alphabetically)—
Fernando Aguado Agelet, Professor, University of Vigo, Spain
John Delaney, Professor, Univ. of Washington, Seattle, United States
Burt Jones, Professor, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Saudi Arabia
Richard Stumpf, NOAA, Coastal Oceanographer, Maryland, United States
Ajit Subramaniam, Professor, Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University, New York, United States
Joao Tasso, Professor, University of Porto, Portugal
Kanna Rajan, Visiting Professor, University of Porto, Portugal and United States
Paulo Relvas, Professor, University of Algarve, Faro, Portugal
Dear Kanna, Joao, Ajit, John and all,
Thanks very much for your very useful comments and inputs. We actually fully agree on the importance of technologies that you mention to help us all transform and integrate ocean observation and modelling in coastal ocean. Innovation in sensors, platforms,… and machine intelligence and machine learning have to play indeed a key role in the Decade, and we are convinced the coastal ocean is the most adequate environment for this (as you have actually shown in some of your recent multi-platform observing and modeling work …).
So, we would very much like to consider your inputs and look forward working together for having the Programme approved at the final UN decade Conference which will happen sometime this year. Looking forward to work with you towards the goals,
Best regards
Joaquín
Joaquin,
Glad to know you all are thinking out large and outside the confines of traditional operational oceanography. We, the undersigned above, would be very happy to contribute in any way that is collaborative and constructive in advancing coastal observation anywhere.
regards
-kanna rajan
_________________________________________________________
Visiting Professor
Laboratório de Sistemas e Tecnologia Subaquática (LSTS)
Faculdade de Engenharia da Universidade do Porto (FEUP)
Universidade do Porto
Porto, Portugal
Old web: https://www.ntnu.edu/employees/kanna.rajan
FEUP: https://sigarra.up.pt/feup/en/func_geral.formview?p_codigo=549794
Tel: +1 (650) 701-3616 (California)
______________________________________________________________
Dear all,
Thank you for this. Several great points have been discussed above which highlight how important this initiative is. I would like to extend the comments on the opportunity to bring together multiple stakeholders and bridge science, solutions/services and capacity. The coastal ocean is indeed a strong interface between the scientific community, industry community (energy, transportation, tourism and so many other sectors), policy makers and coastal communities. The challenge to address needs from multiple stake holders and develop solutions is surely higher in the coastal ocean. At the same time, the ability to leverage from each other to develop added-value solutions is tremendous. We have seen that value in our efforts in the US and strongly support the goals and the driving societal needs of this initiative.
Regards,
Rafael
Ahoy CoastsPredict group!
We offer our wholehearted support of this initiative to emphasize the importance of expanding predictive capabilities in support of science for the global coastal ocean.
Sustainable development in coastal waters requires that member states can identify, quantify, understand, and protect their marine resources, and predict how these are impacted by stressors that include sea level rise, ocean acidification, ocean deoxygenation, overfishing, pollutants, plastic debris and a changing climate.
In the “Global South,” where coastal observing networks are sparse or in their infancy, the downscaling of global OceanPredict class ocean model-based analyses by way of regional numerical modeling is often the first step that scientists take to begin developing the scientific capabilities needed for informed coastal management. A coordinated CoastsPredict community can have significant impact on further expanding these capabilities in the developing world.
Recognizing the importance of coastal observations in support of ocean modeling and prediction, a group of us (the undersigned) have developed a vision to create an international network of practitioners who together create permanent expertise and infrastructure for ensuring equitable, distributed, and coordinated ocean observing, monitoring, and modeling activities. This initiative grew out of expressions of interest at a series of breakout groups and town hall events at the Ocean Obs’19 and the Ocean Sciences 2020 conferences. The network will leverage existing organizations and programs, scaling up those programs that have demonstrated high impact and creating a coordinating body to ensure effective delivery of activities.
We have drafted a document entitled “Developing Ocean Observing Capacity During the UN Decade for Ocean Sciences for Sustainable Development: A Community Prospectus” to present to the UN Decade, and look forward to working hand-in-hand with CoastsPredict, OceanPredict and GOOS in expanding on-the-ground training, seeding programs for new observations, and fostering best practices in the exchange of data and intra-regional collaboration.
Signed –
John Wilkin
Alexis Valauri-Orton
Brian Arbic
Andrew (Drew) Lucas
Dear John, Alexis, Brian and Andrew
thanks a lot for your insightful comments. We are thinking to have cross-projects representation in CoastsPredict steering groups and I hope some of you will join.
In addition, I believe the Coastspredict experts will certainly be available to work in your UN decade project, we might even ask to have Coastspredict projects referring to your methodologies for ocean literacy and capacity building.
I believe together, the two UN Decade programs/projects, will finally produce the critical mass to solve these challenges in the Decade!
Looking forward to more interactions soon
Your concept and advocacy of a global coastal ocean is welcome.
Underlying coastal predictions are two elements that we understand, but could be more clearly stated to reinforce our understanding. They are “trusted data” and “interoperability across systems, capabilities and cultures”. The use of transparent and open methods is an essential part of building a foundation for this very important initiative. The capacity development to use those methods consistently, as noted by Wilkin, et al., above, moves beyond ocean literacy to ocean engagement.