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Good news abounds. FY20 appropriations have been settled, with the Sustained Ocean Observing and Monitoring budget receiving a $2M increase. It is unclear if the Arctic Research Program is in line to receive any increases. We are awaiting decisions at NOAA, OAR, and CPO levels regarding final funding levels for our programs - we are already making some plans regarding our spend plans. [our annual request for FY20 Work Plans was issued on Jan 27, with a due date of March 3].
UN Decade planning is in full swing with multiple regional workshops scheduled for the first 4 months of 2020. NOAA (and OAR in particular) is rallying in support of these planning activities. Coordination and synthesis surrounding inputs at the NOAA and US levels will be increasingly visible in the weeks and months ahead as the planning phase of the UN Decade enters its final stages. Watch for more information, particularly at the Ocean Sciences Meeting.
In the closing months of 2019,
NOAA was presented new contract rates for Iridium data communication services through DOD/DISA. These new rates are unexpectedly much higher than the previous rate, with an aggregate cost for OOMD platforms exceeding multiple $millions per year. Our use of Iridium is widespread, with the largest users being Argo and Surface drifters. The impact of these new prices on our bottom line could be significant. We have established a task team of OAR and key users/PIs to
assess usage and costs across affected projects, identify impact
s
resulting from
the new pricing structure, and strategize to alter the new DISA cost model and/or seek alternative and less expensive Iridium vendors. Stay tuned for more updates on this in the next few months.
I'm pleased to communicate that RDML Tim Gallaudet has taken a strong interest in the Arctic. He is increasing his personal role in Arctic leadership and coordination activities, and has outlined a set of Arctic topics that align with current NOAA priorities. More on this and impacts on Arctic research in the next newsletter.
As other news in the Newsletter indicates, we continue to advance our hiring and staffing changes to address ongoing needs.
We will see many of you in the coming months, at the Ocean Sciences Meeting, and at one of several upcoming Arctic science and planning meetings.
David Legler, Director - Ocean Observing and Monitoring Division
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February 16-21, 2020 in San Diego, CA
Find us (and join us) at the events below:
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GLODAP 2020 Data Meeting: Sunday Feb. 16th, 9:00-17:00, Scripps Seaside Forum. If you are in attending please email
[email protected].
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The Future of Argo Town Hall: Tuesday Feb. 18th, 12:45-13:45 , SDCC - 3, UL. Emily A. Smith, Susan Wjiffels, Dean H Roemmich, Stephen Riser and Nathalie V Zilberman
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TPOS 2020 Networking Dinner: Wednesday Feb. 19th, 18:30-21:30, Patron's Corner. Everyone interested in TPOS 2020 is invited to attend. Please email
[email protected] to reserve a seat (set menu price of $40).
April 21-24, 2020 in College Park, MD
*Abstract submission deadline: February 3rd | Registration deadline: March 13th*
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 Program Updates
Welcome David Allen & Kelley Surhe!
David Allen joined us mid-December as our new Arctic Program Manager. David has worked in the DC metro area since he started work for the US Global Change Research Program (USGCRP), 2003 to 2015. During his tenure at USGCRP, he focused on interagency and international research cooperation. He worked with colleagues from counterpart international agencies in support of international research projects such as the World Climate Research Program (WCRP). He also coordinated and led the national author nomination and review process for international assessments including the UNFCCC's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's 4th and 5th assessment reports and the first World Ocean Assessment.
David has a bachelor's degree from the University of Massachusetts at Boston where he was a sociology and pre-medical sciences major. He began his exploration of marine sciences in the Northeastern University East/West (now Three Seas) Marine Biology Program, and attained a Master's degree from the University Of Washington School Of Oceanography. It was at the University of Washington where David was introduced to the Arctic, where he worked on low temperature microbiology, including cruises aboard the USCGC Polar Sea and the Louis S. St. Laurent.
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Kelley Surhe is our new acting Deputy as of January 13th. Kelley has worked with NOAA since 2004, and joins us from NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration and Research. She is the Deputy Chief of their Exploration and Expeditions Division and has more than a decade of experience coordinating and managing ocean exploration projects and expeditions around the globe. She was a lead planner for CAPSTONE; led efforts from 2013 to 2018 to identify deep-water data collection priorities in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, Atlantic Canyons, Hawaiian Archipelago, American Samoa, Guam and CNMI; and has conducted 13 successful expeditions on NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer, including 10 with the majority of the science team participating via telepresence.
Kelley is currently in Class XI of NOAA's Leadership Competency Development Program. She just completed a detail as a Legislative Affairs Specialist for NOAA's Office of Legislative and Intergovernmental Affairs where she prepared NOAA's Administrator to meet congressional members, and managed NOAA and administration items submitted to Congress for the record. She has a Bachelor's in Conservation Studies from New Century College at George Mason University, and a Master's in Maritime Archaeology from the University of Southampton.
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Five drifting buoys were deployed off OceanX's research vessel, the Alucia in December as it traveled from Miami to Portugal. All five were Directional Wave Spectra Drifters, developed in the Scripps Lagrangian Drifter Lab, and measure
wave properties (period, height, and direction of surface waves) in addition to
sea surface temperature, wind, and atmospheric pressure.
The drifters deployed from this research cruise will study the Gulf Stream, a powerful Western boundary current. Many countries depend on the Gulf Stream to transport goods, which makes this a prime location to study waves as they impact ship navigation and maritime safety.
There are currently about 100 wave drifters out of a total of about 1500 drifters of all types in the global array, which is part of the Global Drifter Program, largely supported by NOAA Research. Data collected by drifters is sent in real-time via the
Global Telecommunication System and helps researchers with models that predict oceanic trends, changing climate, and weather events such as hurricanes.
Read the full article and check near real time data from Scripps'
drifter tracker page (pictured above).
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Global fossil fuel emissions are projected to grow by 0.6% this year, down from 1.5% in 2017 and 2.1% in 2018, to reach almost 37 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) according to new estimates in the Global Carbon Budget 2019, released December 4th by the Global Carbon Project. While coal use is down
dramatically in the United States and the European Union, rising natural gas and oil use in 2019 increased the world's carbon dioxide emissions for a third straight year. Preliminary estimates of emissions from fire deforestation and other land-use changes in 2019 reached 6 billion tonnes of CO2, about 0.8 billion tonnes above 2018 levels. This increase stems partly from elevated fire activity in the Amazon, which has steadily increased since 2008, reaching its highest level in 2019. Fire activity was also unusually high in deforestation zones of Indonesia.
This 14th annual report includes contributions from multiple organizations and research groups around the world, including NOAA's AOML, PMEL, ESRL, and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Read more from the
Global Carbon Project and explore the most up to date data on the
Global Carbon Atlas.
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Arctic Report Card Released
Arctic ecosystems and communities are increasingly at risk due to continued warming and declining sea ice, according to the 2019 Arctic Report Card, released December 10th at the AGU Fall Meeting in San Francisco, CA. For the first time, this report includes an essay written by indigenous Arctic leaders, the Bering Sea Elders group, who provide a glimpse into life in the changing Arctic.
The report was released at an AGU Press Panel where RDML Tim Gallaudet delivered opening remarks to a room packed with over 120 people. Report editor Matthew Druckenmiller, ARP PI Don Perovich, and Bering Sea Elders group representative, Mellisa Johnson spoke on the panel. Chapter authors in the room were invited to the front to answer questions from the audience; the Q&A continued for 15 minutes past the allotted time, a rare occurrence at AGU, for a total of 60 minutes of engagement. Read the press release, watch the video, and read the full report. The Arctic Report Card rollout is a group effort between members of NOAA's Arctic Research Program (ARP), Climate Program Office, Pacific Marine Environmental Lab, OAR's Communications team, and the Report's editors and authors. The Arctic Report Card is produced by more than 80 scientists, including scientists at NOAA, other federal agencies, academia and from 11 other countries.
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Ocean Warming Researched Featured in
New York Times
The past 10 years have been the warmest on record for global ocean temperatures, and new research on this Record-Setting Ocean Warmth was picked up by the New York Times on January 13th. Argo is mentioned as helping fill in gaps in ocean temperature data records that helped with this comprehensive study. Read the full article and original research for more.
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Job Announcement: PMEL Oceanographer - DEADLINE 1/31
OAR's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL) located in Seattle, WA is seeking a Research Oceanographer to serve as a principal investigator in the Global Ocean Ship-based Hydrographic Investigations Program (GO-SHIP). The primary responsibilities of the incumbent will be managing the physical oceanographic portion of the NOAA/PMEL GO-SHIP program, ensuring high-quality CTD/O2 measurements on NOAA GO-SHIP cruises, serving as chief or co-chief scientist on some of those cruises, and publishing oceanographic analyses using GO-SHIP data in refereed scientific journals. The position will also afford opportunities for multi-disciplinary oceanographic research (e.g., involving transient tracers or biogeochemistry) in GO-SHIP, the Argo program, or possibly other oceanographic observation programs.
Job Announcement # (MAP): OAR-PMEL-2020-0001
Job Announcement # (DE): OAR-PMEL-2020-0002
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Call for Applications: NF-POGO Centre of Excellence 2020-2021
The application window is now open for the next Nippon Foundation-POGO Centre of Excellence (
NF-POGO CofE), which provides world class education and training in the field of observational oceanography. This is an intensive training course for young professionals at the post-graduate level, ten months in duration, with an intake of ten trainees per year. The course is sponsored by the
Nippon Foundation and hosted by the
Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research. It is conducted at AWI's site on the offshore island of Helgoland with focus on open-ocean sciences and also at AWI's site on the UNESCO reserve Waddensea island of Sylt where shelf/basin interactions are topics of study.
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Call for Applications: IMBeR's ClimEco7 Summer School
ClimEco7 is the seventh in a series of "Climate and Ecosystems" biennial summer schools organised by IMBeR, the Integrated Marine Biosphere Research project. ClimEco summer schools are designed for 60-70 post-graduate students and early career researchers and are led by an interdisciplinary group of scientists which includes leaders in their respective fields. ClimEco7 will be held at the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Vancouver, Canada from 17-21 August 2020
. The application deadline is March 9 2020. Learn more and apply here!
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Call For Senior Management Meeting Spotlight Presentations
Are you looking for a way to build excitement and support for your research? Consider signing up to deliver a Spotlight Presentation at an upcoming Senior Management Meeting! Every Monday, our leadership in Silver Spring attend the NOAA Research Senior Management Meeting. During each meeting there is an opportunity for scientists and program managers to showcase their research with a 10-15 minute, high level presentation, which can be delivered virtually from the field. The NOAA Research Communications team offers help with a guided practice session. Please contact your program manager and/or our Communications Specialist,
Jessica Mkitarian to sign up!
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Recent Publications
*Watch a one-minute video of lead author Li-Qing Jiang discussing this new research.*
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As always, for the OOMD Community, by the OOMD Community.
Do you have news to share with the OOMD Community, or beyond?
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