Transcript Why Does NOAA Need a Climate & Ecosystem Demonstration Project in the California Current System? Capabilities and Drivers La Jolla, CA 6 June, 2005

Why Does NOAA Need a
Climate & Ecosystem Demonstration
Project in the California Current
System?
Capabilities and Drivers
La Jolla, CA
6 June, 2005
Why the CCS?
following the lead of the NOAA AGM • initiate “place-based demonstration projects” at the local
and regional scale
• develop and demonstrate a “proof of concept” for linking
NOAA climate information with NOAA resource
management, including projection of the status of marine
and coastal living resources in future climates.
Required Program Capability
NOAA Strategies - Climate
• Improve quality and quantity of climate observations, analyses,
interpretation, and archiving by maintaining a consistent climate
record and by improving our ability to determine why changes are
taking place
• Develop ability to predict consequences of climate change on
ecosystems by monitoring changes in coastal and marine ecosystems,
conducting research on climate-ecosystem linkages, and incorporating
climate information into physical-biological models
Required Program Capability
NOAA Strategies - Ecosystems
• Engage and collaborate with partners … to improve regional
ecosystem health
• Manage uses of ecosystems by applying scientifically sound
observations, assessments, and research findings
• Improve resource management by advancing our understanding of
ecosystems through better simulation and predictive models
• Build capabilities of ecological component of NOAA global
environmental observing system… gather information consistent
with established social and economic indicators
Required Program Capability
CROSSCUTTING PRIORITIES
• Integrating Global Environmental Observations
and Data Management
Requirement drivers
• Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Conservation and Management
Act (MSFCMA), Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA),
Endangered Species Act (ESA), and other legislation
• Coastal Zone Management Act (CZMA)
• United States’ Climate Change Scientific Program (CCSP)
• Annual Guidance Memorandum (AGM)
• NOAA and NMFS Strategic Plans
• NOAA Climate and Ecosystem Goals PBAs
• Earth Observation Summit
• Pew Oceans Commission
• U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy
Requirement drivers
Annual Guidance Memorandum (AGM) –
Expand Climate Services
• “NOAA should support the CCSP by accelerating the
delivery of science-based knowledge to policy makers
and resource managers to manage the risks and
opportunities of climate change.
• NOAA should also supply climate information on a
variety of time scales for resource management decisions
involving water, agriculture, fisheries and energy”.
Desired outcomes
(from NOAA Climate PBA)
Goal • predict probable consequences of global climate
change on ecological systems and their living
resources
• deliver knowledge and tools needed to
incorporate climate variability into resource
management
Desired outcomes
• NOAA has made large investments towards
understanding and describing mechanisms of
physical climate system
• very little work to understand impacts of
climate variability on marine ecosystems, and
response of living marine resources and coastal
communities to climate forcing
• build a bridge between “physical forcing” and
“ecosystem response” through observations,
modeling, and research
Capabilities required
(from NOAA Climate PBA
• linking “climate forcing” part of the NOAA
community (the push) with “ecosystem response”
and “living marine resource management” part of
NOAA (the pull)
• Continuously monitor changes in marine ecosystems
• Develop regional-scale coupled physical-biological models
that incorporate climate variability
• Conduct process research of linkages between climate forcing
and ecosystem response
• Produce physical and ecological indicators of current and
future status of climate and ecological systems
• Distribute assessments of marine ecosystem health and
productivity
Methodology to derive capability
(from NOAA Climate PBA)
• only critically important ecosystems selected
for long term, climate integrated assessments
• species and sites especially sensitive to
climate variability designated as sentinel
species and sites
• monitored and observed as described in the
Ecosystem Goal PBA
• benefit to/from other NOAA programs and
activities that support other missions.
Methodology to derive capability
(from NOAA Climate PBA)
Vision –
• take elements of existing NOAA programs to
develop integrated national Climate and
Ecosystems program that will provide resource
managers the knowledge and tools to deal with
the consequences of climate change to marine
ecosystems
• place-based demonstration projects
Why the CCS?
(from NOAA Climate PBA)
• ability to successfully complete demonstration projects
greatly enhanced by sites that will produce rapid results
• selection of regions based in part on known sensitivity of
ecosystem or their resources to climate variability
• site has long time series of physical and biological
observations available for study, and modeling sufficiently
advanced to produce useful products with little lead-time
• infrastructure exists to immediately begin necessary work
• project candidates include fisheries-rich ecosystems of the
North Pacific
What is key about CCS?
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strong climate signal reflected in its ecosystem variability
highly productive and economically valuable LMRs
several important PR populations
populations representative of many other ecosystems
“sentinel species” sensitive to climate, key for detecting climate impacts
NOAA has new mandate of ecosystem-based management
currently 49 observing systems and several long-term programs
long history of collaboration on climate and fisheries issues
good hypotheses about mechanisms
consensus on priorities and approach
PaCOOS is an established, ideal umbrella for this work
Additional material
What is needed for CCS?
• link observing systems and programs better for synergism
• apply their data and knowledge for management
• currently do relatively little holistic ecosystem research, and even less
ecosystem management
• need improved models and observations to test hypotheses
• pilot project a model for understanding climate effects on a regional
marine ecosystem in the context of an overall ecosystem approach to
resource management. This will cost money, but be more economical
than doing each species separately
• We have all the right ingredients to succeed (obs, models, long time
series, climate signal, indicators). This model and its successes can be
exported to other ecosystems.
Performance Objectives
(from NOAA SP)
• Understand and predict consequences of climate variability
and change on marine ecosystems (Climate Goal)
• Increase number of fish stocks managed at sustainable levels
(Ecosystem Goal)
• Increase number of regional coastal and marine ecosystems
delineated with approved indicators of ecological health and
socioeconomic benefits that are monitored and understood
(Ecosystem Goal)
Why the CCS?
• project candidates include fisheries-rich
ecosystems of the North Pacific (Gulf of Alaska
and California Current)
• North Pacific projects will evaluate the impacts of
El Niño events and climate regime shifts on
fisheries, harmful algal blooms and coastal
erosion.