IMOS BlueWater

Chris Sabine

Bluewater Node of IMOSSusan Wijffels, Ken Ridgway, Anthony Richardson,

Eric Schulz, Bronte Tilbrook and the rest of the Bluewater Team

IMOS BlueWater

3 major themes identified at the June workshop

• Ocean Variability and Climate Change

• Bio-Physical Coupling

• Boundary Current/Shelf Interactions

• Gas Hydrates and Biosphere (IODP)

IMOS BlueWater

Bluewater: Observational Needs for Research

Major research questions:• What is the role of the ocean in weather, climate variability

and change? • What role does the ocean play in setting atmospheric carbon

levels?• Where and how does ocean and climate variability impact on

pelagic ecosystems, their productivity and fisheries?• How do large-scale offshore changes affect our coastal

environment and ecosystems?• Is there predictability in the system and where? On what

timescales?

IMOS BlueWater

Bluewater: Observational Needs for Research

• satellite sea-level, SST, ocean colour, winds: sustained and with cal/val.

• broad-scale ocean structure: sustained• broad-scale ecosystem structure: sustained• broad-scale BGC measurements: sustained• boundary currents and associated eddy system,

interfaced with a shelf array• detailed carbon budget studies

IMOS BlueWater

Modelling/integration Needs for Research

• Global data-assimilating ocean and atmospheric models

• Earth simulators• Detailed regional models – both coupled and

uncoupled• BGC and ecosystem models

We need strong links and to coordinate with these activities to fully exploit IMOS and to help improve its impact and design.

IMOS BlueWater

Approach1. Identified gaps in network and those most urgent

to fill2. Built on existing demonstrated national capacities

• reduce risk and ensure quick roll-out • expect high success rate in most elements

3. Expand system across disciplines and ecosystem components

4. Select elements well integrated into international programs

5. Strive for real-time systems • needed for growing national capacity in ocean

reanalysis and forecasting• resulting gridded fields will greatly expand uptake by

the research community

IMOS BlueWater

Argo: a means of tracking the slow large-scale structure of the upper 2000m

150m global temperature analysis from Neville Smith at BMRC: http://www.bom.gov.au/bmrc/ocean/results/

IMOS BlueWater

Argo: a means of tracking the slow large-scale structure of the upper 2000m

May

Nov

Sept.July

Jan

2006/2007 Indian Ocean Dipole and El Nino – best measured yet!

IMOS BlueWater

IMOS Argo

• 50 T/S Argo floats per year (assuming a continuation of existing contributions from AGO, CSIRO and BoM)

• Prospect for some oxygen deployments via supplementary funding from CSIRO (yet to be confirmed)

IMOS BlueWater

Air-sea fluxes: critical but poorly known

Grist and Josey (2006) NOC1.1a surface heat flux climatology – based on best marine surface observations, most recent bulk formulae and adjusted to fit large-scale ocean constraints

Heat flux out of the ocean in

W/m2

IMOS BlueWater

Air-sea fluxes: so which do you force an ocean model with or use to validate a coupled model?

WHOI OA ERA40 NCEP1

Calibrated satellite obs. Atm. Reanalysis Atm. Reanalysis

IMOS BlueWater

IMOS Surface fluxes: providing high-quality validation data sets

We face a dearth of validation in the oceans around Australia and particularly in southern high-latitudes

IMOS will:

1. Instrument RV Aurora Australia and RV Southern Surveyor with high-quality marine meteorological suite and radiation measurements

2. Establish a flux-measuring surface mooring at the Southern Ocean Time Series (SOTS) site

IMOS BlueWater

Major Current Systems Influence Region • Advective component of ocean heat/salt budget and complements Argo’s storage measurements

• strong intraseasonal to interannual variability

• water mass variability little known

• climate change e.g. EAC strengthening and warming? Do we have direct evidence?

IMOS BlueWater

Monitoring regional currents from SOOP

• Eastern, western & southern Boundary Currents, northern shelf regions, GBR

• coastal to basin-width – transport resolving

• seasonal to decadal – does not resolve submonthly timescales (eddy processes)

• Real-time and delayed mode

• Temperature only

IMOS BlueWater

Eddy resolving WBC monitoring is missing

• need to fill the crucial gap between offshore large-scale processes and onshelf conditions

• get T as well as S and v

• plan for pilot IMOS Bluewater Glider deployments needs to be developed

IMOS BlueWater

Standardised anomaly plots

Regime Shifts and Ecological Impacts: we see hints in our region but sufficient data is rare. Compare with long series collected in the North Atlantic

SST

Phytoplankton Colour

Dinoflagellates

Diatoms

Edwards et al. (2006) L&O

IMOS BlueWater

Beaugrand et al. (2003) Nature

Climate Change: Cod Collapse

IMOS BlueWater

Multidisciplinary Underway Network: AusCPR and BGC Underway Observing System

• enhance and broaden existing underway measurement programs using commercial and research ships of opportunity (SOOP)

• establish phytoplankton and zooplankton and basic BGC measurements on ship of opportunity lines providing national coverage for the first time

Plankton, T, S & Fl

XBT - T(x, z)

PCO2Summer only

IMOS BlueWater

Research Enabled

• Links between planktonic ecosystem structure and large-scale physical variability

• Links between ocean ML chemistry and uptake of gases and large-scale physical variability

• Validation/development data sets for BGC and ecosystem models

IMOS BlueWater

•

Critical Sites for Detailed Local Measurements

Moored Phys-Chem-Bio Observatory in the Australian Sub Antarctic – for quantifying Southern Ocean influence on global carbon balance, impacts of acidification, controls on productivity, calibration of remote sensing - builds on existing ACE CRC and SOOP programs

IMOS BlueWater

IMOS Bluewater - a myriad of research applications

1. Dynamics and predictability of seasonal climate variability2. Ocean’s role in global heat balance3. Climate Change fingerprinting4. Sea level rise5. Ocean circulation and dynamics6. Air/sea interaction7. Dynamics and predictability of intraseasonal variability8. Biogeochemical/Ecosystem Model Development9. Carbon uptake10. Ocean acidification11. Climate change impacts on physics, chemistry and biology12. Remote sensing validation13. Marine Biodiversity14. Ecosystem Health15. Biogeochemical and Biological Oceanography16. Fisheries Oceanography17. Marine conservation18. Dispersal of marine pests19. Ecology of pelagic and coastal species20. …..

IMOS BlueWater

Issues

• Integration with coastal/regional nodes

• Outreach – data availability key along with gridded products.

• eMII is core function – we all need to make it work – IMOS will live and die by its presence on the web and data uptake

• WBC’s remain a big challeng

IMOS BlueWater

END

• Thanks