This chapter is comprised of FY 2003 progress reports followed by FY 2004 plans submitted by scientists funded by NOAA’s Climate Observation Program. A request for annual progress reports using a new structured report format was issued in late August 2003 (see Appendix D). Excerpts from the submitted reports are presented here summarizing efforts focused on enhancement of the global ocean observing system for climate.

The chapter begins with a report describing the Office of Climate Observation’s Climate Observation Program, the primary sponsor of the documented projects, followed first by a table of OCO-funded projects and their accompanying web sites, and then by an overview of the Observing System Monitoring Center (OSMC), including a description of partners involved. The reports that follow are in alphabetical order based on the Principal Investigator’s last name.

Introduction

This report provides an annual progress report and work plan for NOAA’s Climate Observation Program. The program was initiated by the Office of Global Programs (OGP) with Climate and Global Change (C&GC) funding in 1998. Since then the program has grown to include funding accounted for within seven separate OAR budget lines. This report presents the composite Program as administered through the Office of Climate Observation (OCO).

Program Description

Goal and Objectives:
The goal of the program is to build and sustain the ocean component of a global climate observing system that will respond to the long term observational requirements of the operational forecast centers, international research programs, and major scientific assessments. The program objectives are to:

• document long term trends in sea level change;
• document ocean carbon sources and sinks;
• document the ocean’s storage and global transport of heat and fresh water;
• document ocean-atmosphere exchange of heat and fresh water.

The observing system needs to have the capability to deliver continuous instrumental records and analyses accurately documenting:

• Sea level to identify changes resulting from climate variability.
• Ocean carbon content every ten years and the air-sea exchange seasonally.
• Sea surface temperature and surface currents to identify significant patterns of climate variability.
• Sea surface pressure and air-sea exchanges of heat, momentum, and fresh water to identity changes in forcing function driving ocean conditions and atmospheric conditions.
• Ocean heat and fresh water content and transports to identify where anomalies enter the ocean, how they move and are transformed, and where they re-emerge to interact with the atmosphere.
• The essential aspects of thermohaline circulation and the subsurface expressions of the patterns of climate variability.
• Sea ice thickness and concentrations.

The recent Earth Observation Summit raised to the highest levels of governments the awareness of the need for a global observation system. The climate question is high on the political agendas of many nations and can be answered authoritatively only by sustained earth observation. The Earth Observation Summit reaffirmed NOAA’s leadership and commitment to fulfilling the need for global coverage and the Climate Observation Program is NOAA’s management tool for implementing the ocean component.

Partnerships:
The Climate Observation Program is managed as an inter-LO, interagency, and international effort. Presently most NOAA contributions to the global system are being implemented by the OAR laboratories, joint institutes and university partners. NOS, NMFS, and NWS maintain observational infrastructure for ecosystems, transportation, marine services and coastal forecasting that do or have potential to contribute to climate observation. NOS sea level measurements in particular provide one of the best and longest climate records existent. NESDIS data centers are essential. NMAO ship operations are necessary for supporting ocean work. NESDIS and NPOESS continuous satellite missions are needed to provide the remote sensing that complements the in situ measurements.

International and interagency partnerships are central to the Climate Observation Program implementation strategy. All of the Program’s contributions to global observation are managed in cooperation internationally with the Joint WMO/IOC Technical Commission for Oceanography and Marine Meteorology (JCOMM), and nationally with the U.S. Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS). NSF has initiated their Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) which will potentially provide significant infrastructure in support of ocean climate observation, beginning in FY 2006. The ongoing NSF-NOAA cooperative project for CLIVAR-carbon ocean surveys has proved to be an interagencyinternational-interdisciplinary success. ONR maintains a GODAE data server at Monterey that needs to be sustained after the experiment period (2003-2005) as permanent international infrastructure. The UNOLS fleet provides ship support for ocean operations. NASA’s development of remote sensing techniques is key.

Focus of the Program:

• Extending the in situ networks to achieve global coverage – moored and drifting buoys, profiling floats, tide gauges stations, and repeated ship lines. The networks are illustrated in Figure 1.
• Building associated data and assimilation subsystems.
• Building observing system management and product delivery infrastructure.

Linkage to NOAA strategic goals:

• NOAA’s Mission Goal 2 – “Understand climate variability and change to enhance society’s ability to plan and respond.”
• NOAA Strategy – Monitor and Observe: “We will invest in high-quality, long-term climate observations and will encourage other national and international investments to provide a comprehensive observing system in support of climate assessments and forecasts.”

• Outcome -- A sustained global system of complementary in situ, satellite, data, and modeling subsystems adequate to accurately document the state of the ocean and force climate models.

• Performance Measures:
  NOAA Performance Measures (from the Strategic Plan):
  • Increased number of long-term observations collected, archived, available, and accessible where random errors and time-dependent biases have been minimized and assessed.
  • Increased number, accuracy, and regional specificity of U.S. climate, water, and coastal resource products.
  • Increased volume of NOAA climate data and information used by NOAA customers.
  • Decreased uncertainty in observational measures and elimination of observation gaps, redundancies, and losses to achieve better coverage, timeliness, reliability, and maintainability of observations for users.
  • Increased use of other nations’ observation platforms, resources, and assets to meet user observation and data management requirements.
  • Increased number of partnerships that promote international cooperation in global observations and data management programs.
  • New climate observations introduced.
  • Number of new monitoring or forecast products that become operation/year. Program Specific Performance Measures:
  • Reduced uncertainty in projections of sea level rise during the 21st century.
  • Reduced uncertainty in estimates of the increase in carbon inventory in the global ocean.
  • Reduced error in global measurement of sea surface temperature.

	Year	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009
% complete:		40	45	48	53	77	88	94	99

Communications plan for providing information to decision makers (government and nongovernment):
The observing system delivers the “up front” information to the forecast centers, research programs, and assessments. In the past, the program has depended largely on these partner Climate Program Components to develop and deliver information products that are user-friendly for management and policy decisions. During FY 2003, however, the need was identified for the program to begin addressing the development of climate data records and analyses as first order products in addition to depending on the forecast, research, and assessment partners for climate product delivery. In 2004 and beyond the project will produce an Annual Report on the State of the Ocean and the Observing System. The report will include sections targeted for three audiences: 1) decision-makers and non-scientist, 2) scientists, 3) observing system managers.

How implementation is being accomplished:
The “Networks” are managed by distributed centers of expertise at the NOAA Labs, Centers, Joint Institutes and university partners. The “System” is centrally managed at the Project Office of Climate Observation (OCO), a division of OGP with dual reporting to OGP and the NOAA Climate Office.

Where it is being done (lab, university, joint institute):
AOML, PMEL, ETL, JIMAR (University of Hawaii), JIMO (Scripps Institution of Oceanography), CICOR (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution), JISAO (University of Washington), CIMAS (University of Miami), CICAR (Columbia University), NCDC, NODC, CO-OPS, AMC, PMC, NDBC, FSU (Florida State University), and OCO.

By whom (detail on number and type of personnel involved):

• 43 Federal FTEs
• 90 non-Federal FTEs
• 2 Contract FTEs and 1 Federal seconded FTE at international coordination offices

• Operational forecast centers (e.g., NCEP, ECMWF, BoM, JMA)
• International research programs (e.g., CLIVAR, GEWEX, ASOF)
• Major scientific assessments – national and international (e.g., IPCC)

FY 2003 Accomplishments:
Incremental advances were accomplished across four of the networks. The global carbon inventory survey was initiated. Eighty additional drifters were ordered but not deployed by the end of the fiscal year – they were deployed by the end of the calendar year. The Florida Current time series was shifted to sustained operations. Although not managed as part of this program, the Argo array is a central element of the system; Argo advanced by 379 floats deployed. The ocean system overall advanced from 40% complete in FY 2002 to 45% complete in FY 2003 which is 1% greater than the milestone target of 44%.

The new Office of Climate Observation (OCO) was established in accordance with the Annual Operating Plan as “a center to manage the climate observing system under the auspices of the NOAA Climate Program Office” (Q3 milestone). The OCO terms of reference provide for development of value added services to:

• Monitor the status of the globally distributed networks; report system statistics and metrics routinely and on demand.
• Evaluate the effectiveness of the system; recommend improvements.
• Advance the multi-year Program Plan; evolve the in situ networks.
• Focus intra-agency, interagency, and international coordination.
• Organize external review and user feedback.
• Produce annual reports on the state of the ocean and the adequacy of the observing system for climate.

A format was established for OCO to begin issuing a routine Annual Report on the State of the Ocean and the Observing System. The first report, for FY 2003, will be issued in March 2004. The report will:

• Explain the ocean’s role in climate, in layman’s terms.
• Provide information on the observed state of the ocean during the year.
• Document observing system activities during the year, based on the project manager annual reports.
• Summarize important advancements in ocean climate science during the year based on published scientific papers.

• Four “goal teams” will focus on evolving the observing system to ensure adequate and accurate measurement of ocean state and forcing variables:
  1. Sea level variability and change
  2. Ocean carbon sources and sinks
  3. Ocean storage and transport of heat and fresh water
  4. Air-sea exchange of heat and fresh water

• Three “mission teams” will cross-cut all goals to ensure that the observing system evolves in response to NOAA’s forecast and assessment missions:
  1. Seasonal Forecasting
  2. Decadal Forecasting
  3. Climate Change

OCO began issuing routine quarterly reports on Observing System Status for the system’s adequacy in measurement of sea surface temperature (see below). Status reports will be created in the future for all ocean state variables.