This project will provide service and maintenance of sensors and ground-truthing of the mooring data at the Gray's Reef OA monitoring site, as well as data quality control and synthesis. Specifically, we will accomplish the follow three tasks: 1. Deployment and maintenance of the sensors (pCO2, pH, and dissolved oxygen); 2. Collection of underway pCO2 data and bulk water samples for analyses using ship-of-opportunity and dedicated cruises about four times a year; and 3. Data quality control and data synthesis.

This project will serve to (1) synthesize National Coral Reef Monitoring Program (NCRMP) OA Enterprise observations; (2) compare reef OA observations to oceanic end members to infer reefscale biogeochemical processes, and finally (3) use these synthesis products to better link projection models of oceanic carbonate systems to reef-scale OA impacts. The NCRMP OA enterprise supports: our collection of seawater samples from reef and surface observations; a set of MapCO2 buoys in the Caribbean and Hawaii; diurnal monitoring instruments (e.g. CREP's diurnal suite, AOML's/McGillis' BEAMS); and metrics of ecosystem response to OA (e.g. CAUs, coral coring, etc.). The datasets generated by these activities will be the focus of this wide-ranging synthesis.

NCRMP‐OA is a Joint Enterprise designed to address the Tier 1 Ocean Acidification (OA) components of the larger NCRMP strategic framework at Class 0, II, and III stations. Field work and laboratory analyses for the Atlantic/Caribbean region (Florida, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands [USVI], and Flower Garden Banks [FGB]) are executed by the OAR Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory (AOML) and by the University of Puerto Rico (UPR) Caribbean Coastal Ocean Observing System (CariCOOS). Field work in the Pacific region (Main Hawaiian Islands [MHI], Northwestern Hawaiian Islands [NWHI], Guam, Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands [CNMI], American Sāmoa, and the Pacific Remote Island Areas [PRIA]) is executed by the NMFS Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center [PIFSC] Coral Reef Ecosystem Division (CRED); laboratory analyses for the Pacific region are executed by the OAR Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL). NCRMP‐OA Teams closely coordinate with other NCRMP elements (benthic, fish, water temperature, satellite, and socioeconomic teams), including PMEL’s NOAA Ocean Acidification Observing Network (NOA‐ON), other NOAA offices, Federal, State, and Territory agencies, and academic partners, in both the Atlantic and Pacific regions.  

This project monitors changes to coral reef carbonate chemistry over time, at US affiliated coral reef sites, through quantifying key chemical parameters that are expected to be impacted by ocean acidification. This effort addresses OAP programmatic themes 1 and 5 by maintaining the coral reef portion of the OA monitoring network and developing a procedure for data synthesis, assimilation, and distribution. Incorporating an interdisciplinary approach, this project will collect, process, analyze, and steward dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) and total alkalinity (TA) water sample data to document seawater carbonate chemistry at Class 0, II, III climate monitoring sites in coral reef areas of the US Atlantic and Pacific regions.

This OAP project represents the first contribution of OAP to sustained coastal Alaska OA monitoring through three years (2015-2017) of maintenance of two previously established OA mooring sites located in critical fishing areas. In FY2015, It also supported a 19 day OA survey cruise along the continental shelf of the Gulf of Alaska in summer of 2015, designed to fill observing gaps that have made it difficult to quantify the extent of OA events. This support has been critical for continuing OA research in Alaska, as the initial infrastructure funding was not sufficient or intended for long-term operation. 

These OAP-sponsored monitoring and observing activities support a number of cross-cutting research efforts. Firstly, the data itself will provide new insights into the seasonal progression of OA events caused by the progressive accumulation of anthropogenic CO2 into the region's coastal seas. The mooring and cruise data can also be used as an early warning system for stakeholders around the state, as well as to provide information for other types of OA research. Other projects within the OAP Alaska Enterprise focus on laboratory based evaluation of the impact of OA on commercially and ecologically important Alaskan species, especially during the vulnerable larval and juvenile life stages. This environmental monitoring informs those studies by describing the intensity, duration, and extent of OA events and providing a baseline for projecting future conditions. Finally, this observational data is used to validate new OA models that are currently being developed for the Gulf of Alaska and Bering Sea, and are applied in bio-economic models of crab and pollock abundance forecasts (e.g., Punt et al., 2014; Mathis et al., 2014).

The California Current is a dynamic eastern boundary system that spans the Northeast Pacific from Canada to Baja California, Mexico. Upwelling of cold, nutrient rich water drives multi trophic level productivity throughout much of the domain, but also results in naturally acidic on-shelf waters on regional scales. In addition, anthropogenic CO2 on basin to global scales, and local inputs by eutrophication, fresh water inputs, and local respiration or carbon assimilation result in multiscale and context-specific perturbations to the carbonate system. Thus, to understand, manage, or mitigate the effect of ocean acidification on ocean ecosystems, we need to quantify a suite of carbonate system parameters along the Pacific Coast in a mechanistic, spatially explicit, and temporally dynamic fashion.

We propose to embed an improved semi-analytical carbonate-chemistry prediction model within a dynamic classification of pelagic seascapes derived from satellite remotely sensed variables, including, but not limited to, phytoplankton standing stock (chl-a), SST, and wind stress. We will produce synoptic time series and nowcasts of surface TCO2, TALK, pH and Ω that will facilitate regional comparisons of interannual trends in OA parameters. We will include metrics of model and spatiotemporal uncertainty to better inform management decisions. These maps will be validated with the wealth of multi-parameter OA data generated from recent NOAA-supported field-observational efforts, from coastal moorings, West-coast OA cruises, and shore-based Burke-o-Lators. Statistical analyses will quantify spatially explicit trends across OA parameters, and local deviations from seascape-based predictions will disentangle basin-scale oceanic vs. local drivers of the carbonate system. Maps will be served in near real time on IOOS data portals. Time series and maps will inform marine ecosystem management and provide metrics of ocean health for National Marine Sanctuary condition reports.