O A R

O A R

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research

VISION

A society that uses the results of our research as the scientific basis for more productive and harmonious relationships between humans and the environment.

MISSION

To conduct environmental research, provide scientific information and research leadership, and transfer research into products and services to help NOAA meet the evolving economic, social, and environmental needs of the Nation.

NOAA Research Matters

CONTENTS

The Challenges of a Changing Planet

A Letter from the Assistant Administrator

4-5

UNDERSTANDING OUR CHANGING CLIMATE OAR Scientists Bring Home Nobel Prize for Climate Change Leadership 6

Predicting Our Future: Climate Models Recognized

Around the World

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Tracking CO : A Global Climate Record

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Extreme Weather Impacts: Predicting El Ni?o and La Ni?a

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Partnerships for Bridging Climate Science and Society

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Pinpointing Shifts in America's

Changing Climate

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IMPROVING WEATHER FORECASTS

Hurricanes: Improved Track and Intensity Predictions

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Tornadoes: Heroic Technology Advances Weather Forecasting

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PROTECTING THE PUBLIC'S HEALTH

Ozone: Changing Environmental Outcomes Through

Discovery and Mitigation

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Air Quality: Nailing Down the Source of Ozone Pollution

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A Breath of Fresh Air: Improving Air Quality Predictions for

the Nation

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EXPLORING THE OCEAN-CLIMATE CONNECTION

Argo's "Robotic Oceanographers" Take the Ocean's Vital Signs

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Tsunamis: Getting Beyond "If the ground shakes, if the water recedes, or

if you hear a loud roar"

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Ocean Acidification: Climate Change Impacts on the Marine Environment 19

The Ocean as Laboratory: Undersea Vents as Models for Ocean

Acidification, Carbon Capture, and the Unknown

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"America's Ship for Ocean Exploration": New Technologies Bring the Excitement of Real-time Discovery Ashore

ENSURING ECONOMIC VITALITY

Safe Transport: Water Level Forecasting in the Great Lakes Alternative Energy: Harvesting the Ocean's Potential

EDUCATING THE PUBLIC Science on a Sphere?: Visualizing the Dynamics of a Changing Earth

Joining the "YouTube Generation": Ocean Explorer Website

OAR Laboratories and Programs

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24 25 26-27

For more information contact us: OAR Headquarters 1315 East-West Highway Silver Spring, MD 20910 301-713-2458 oar.

Image, this page: A diver coaxes a transparent organism into a collection jar during a 2007 exploratory mission. Opposite page: OAR scientist, Jeremy Potter, on a 2005 NOAA Arctic mission.

Richard W. Spinrad, Ph.D., CMarSci Assistant Administrator for Oceanic and Atmospheric Research

"The research impacts in this document tell the story of some of the preeminent contributions OAR scientists and our partners have made to build the knowledge base, tools, products, and services through which we can better understand and address the dynamics of our changing planet."

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The Challenges of a Changing Planet

A Letter from the Assistant Administrator

Dear Reader:

In the decades and century to come, we will experience extraordinary changes in our world's oceans and atmosphere, with consequences that may dramatically change the way we live our lives. Reducing uncertainty, whether in predicting future climate, severe weather, or changes in our ecosystems, requires a solid understanding of the Earth as an interdependent system of ocean, air, and land.

Through the preeminent research conducted and sponsored by NOAA's Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research, or OAR, we render knowledge and technology that drive products and services that reduce those risks. Ultimately, these products and services prevent loss of human life, improve management of natural resources, build understanding of the Earth-system, and strengthen the economy. This document represents OAR leadership in understanding how the ocean, atmosphere, and climate change that impact our health, our economy, and our future.

As we look to the future, OAR will

tackle a number of large societal "...OAR will tackle

challenges. Perhaps the greatest is climate change. Defining the nature

a number of large

of climate change, and its potential societal challenges.

impacts, is foremost in our research Perhaps the greatest

agenda. Our scientists will build on is climate change."

the CM2.1 climate model, which has

become known as one of the best climate models in the world, to

help anticipate more accurately future societal needs.

Americans rely on weather forecasts and warnings that save lives, and protect property. Technologies transitioned from NOAA research labs and programs into weather forecast offices across the Nation are the backbone of today's weather services.

Though our weather forecasting capabilities have improved dramatically over the past two decades, the public expects even more accurate forecasts and earlier warnings. Working with the National Weather Service, as part of the proposed 10-year Hurricane Forecast Improvement Project (HFIP), OAR researchers will apply expert science to support better predictions of hurricane intensity. Over the next few years, the NEXRAD Doppler radar system will upgrade to a dual-polarized radar system to detect different types of precipitation better. In a decade, we anticipate an even more sensitive technology, Multi-function Phased Array Radar (MPAR), an innovative application of proven Navy technology, will provide longer lead times for warning on forecasts of hazardous weather.

Recognizing that air safety relies on accurate and timely weather predictions, OAR is engaged in developing a single national NextGen Network Enabled Weather system (NNEW) for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). NNEW will be a conduit to tens of thousands of weather observations and forecasts updated in real-time explicitly for the FAA to reduce delays and accidents in commercial aviation.

Drought and flooding likely will intensify as a result of global warming. This impacts our ability to produce food and manage water resources. The NOAA-led National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS), a collaboration between numerous federal agencies and state governments, promises to provide vital information for community planners and decision makers.

Marine life, from microscopic life forms at the bottom of the food web to larger species such as coral, shellfish, and commercial fisheries, will be affected by "ocean acidification." Commercial fisheries, already failing, may suffer further economic loss. OAR researchers are at the forefront of studying and monitoring this marker of climate change. Currently, a lone buoy equipped with sensors measures the extent of acidification in the Gulf of Alaska. We will need more and better sensors, technologies for studying impacts on physiology and ecosystems, and modeling efforts to provide ecological models, predictions, and forecasts.

All OAR research is grounded in observation data. Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) will revolutionize NOAA's ability to monitor the global environment, improve predictive services, and enhance homeland security. UAS will fill critical observation gaps and benefit climate change research, weather and water resources forecasting, ecosystem monitoring and management, and coastal mapping.

The research impacts in this document tell the story of some of the preeminent contributions OAR scientists and our partners have made to build the knowledge base, tools, products, and services through which we better understand and address the dynamics of our changing planet. OAR will remain a world leader in understanding our oceans, atmosphere, and climate ? and how they impact our health, our economy, and our future.

Richard W. Spinrad, Ph.D., CMarSci Assistant Administrator for Oceanic and Atmospheric Research

Images, top to bottom: A RemotelyOperated Vehicle is deployed during the Arctic 2005 Exploration; A Google Earth display of Global Ocean Observing System data; an Aerosonde? Unmanned Aircraft System is launched in Nov. 2007 from a moving platform to rendezvous with Hurricane Noel.

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"...warming of the climate system is unequivocal..."

"A unanimous, definitive world statement"

House Science and Technology Committee Chairman Bart Gordon (D-Tenn), Washington Post, February 3, 2007

CLIMATE

OAR Scientists Bring Home Nobel Prize for Climate Change Leadership

Recognized "for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change," more than 120 NOAA scientists contributed to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report which shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize.

Impact Scientific consensus about climate change and its causes

Of the NOAA Nobel group, just under half were OAR researchers. OAR contributions for this international effort, included leadership, model simulations, analysis, authorship and editoral review, all highlighting the preeminent science conducted by our researchers. Dr. Susan Solomon, a senior scientist of OAR's Earth System Research Laboratory (ESRL), co-chaired Working Group 1, the Physical Science Basis. OAR scientists from OAR laboratories, programs, and joint and cooperative institutes served as contributors and government reviewers of the final report based upon published peer-reviewed literature. For this report, more than 5,000 scientific publications were referenced.

The 2007 IPCC Fourth Assessment Report was more insistent than earlier reports that there has been "dangerous anthropogenic [man-made] interference with the climate system."

In 1988, the United Nations established the IPCC "to provide the decision-makers and others interested in climate change with an objective source of information about climate change." The IPCC Assessments, internationally recognized as the premier source about climate change, are used by scientists and policy makers worldwide to describe the science behind climate change and to anticipate future trends. The IPCC relies on world-class scientists from 113 governments to scour and evaluate the body of scientific literature on climate science. The latest assessment received over 30,000 comments by 650 scientists, each painstakingly taken into account in the final synthesis.

The names of all NOAA Nobel recipients were recorded in the 2008 Congressional Record at the request of Senator Olympia Snow (R-Maine).

Learn More: ipcc.ch/ipccreports/ assessments-reports.htm

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Images, top to bottom: President George W. Bush meets in the Oval Office with the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize recipients including Dr. Susan Solomon, OAR; IPCC Fourth Assessment Report; Nobel Medal.

NOAA Research Matters

CLIMATE

Predicting Our Future: Climate Models Recognized Around the World

Impact

World-class climate modeling set a new benchmark for long-term prediction

One of the most highly-regarded climate models in the world, developed by OAR's Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL), had a prominent role in the Fourth Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The GFDL CM2.1 global coupled climate model provides increased credibility for understanding the observed past climate changes and for making future climate change projections.

Climate models are computer-based simulations that use mathematical formulas to recreate the chemical and physical processes that drive Earth's climate. GFDL has produced groundbreaking work in climate modeling since the late 1960s when it released the firstof-its-kind general circulation climate model that combined oceanic and atmospheric processes.

Recently, GFDL scientists have used a "descendant" from the very first climate model to understand the factors driving 20th century climate change, and to simulate the projections of climate changes over the 21st century and beyond that may be induced by increasing atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide.

Looking to future climate modeling needs, the model incorporates the next generation in modeling infrastructure, the Flexible Modeling System. The system provides a common platform for diverse research activities, from weather to seasonal prediction to

anthropogenic (man-made) climate change.

Research is now underway to improve resolution of the model, to increase the realism of the climate processes represented in the model, and to reduce the key uncertainties. Future models enabled by necessary advances in computing will enhance NOAA's ability to simulate regional climate change, as well as abrupt shifts and extremes in climate.

OAR's Joseph Smagorinsky, GFDL Founding Director (1924 ? 2005): visionary in numerical weather prediction and climate modeling

Image: Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory CM2.1 Model depicts Arctic sea ice changes.

NOAA Research Matters

OAR's GFDL scientists created simulations for more than 5,000 years of past, future and idealized climate standards, setting the bar for climate modeling.

7 Learn More: gfdl.

CarbonTracker,

a newly-released tool visualizing global CO2 measurements, is a valued resource for corporate and government sectors in evaluating the effectiveness of their carbon emission reduction efforts.

Learn More: mlo. esrl.gmd/ccgg/ carbontracker

CLIMATE

Tracking CO2: A Global Climate Record

The striking profile of the last half Impact

century's rising carbon dioxide levels, known among scientists as "the Keeling

Historic

Curve," has become an icon of climate global carbon

change science. This longest- continuous measurements

record of atmospheric carbon dioxide inform society of

(CO2) concentration in the world, found its roots first at the South Pole and

a changing planet

shortly thereafter at NOAA's Mauna Loa

Observatory in Hawaii. At the time this work began, very little was

known about CO2 levels in the environment.

Just over 50 years ago, Charles Keeling plotted the first data

points on his graph from data collected at both locations. Keeling, an

atmospheric scientist at Scripps Institute of Oceanography, along

with colleague Roger Revelle and others, were in pursuit of a theo-

retical model speculating that

accelerated burning of fossil fuels

could potentially alter the Earth's

climate dramatically by increas-

ing atmospheric CO2. A feat of historic proportions, Keeling's

legacy lives on as OAR's Earth

System Research Laboratory (ESRL)

researchers continue to collect

data at the Mauna Loa Observa-

tory daily. The U.S. Department

of Energy's Carbon Dioxide Infor-

mation Analysis Center (CDIAC),

The "Keeling Curve," an iconic example of climate change

one of many portals for these data, has logged over 10,000 requests for the Mauna Loa CO2 records since 1984, when Keeling

first made the dataset available

to CDIAC.

Keeling's work stimulated formation of an international global climate observations network, which provides valuable input into assessments of global climate change, most notably, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Assessments.

Expanding on the Mauna Loa record, ESRL researchers developed a new tool, CarbonTracker, which visualizes global CO2 measurements. Released in 2007, CarbonTracker is of interest to corporate and government sectors that seek to evaluate the effectiveness of efforts to reduce or store carbon emissions. CarbonTracker is a NOAA contribution to the North American Carbon Program.

Images, top to bottom: CarbonTracker graphic; carbon dioxide emissions.

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NOAA Research Matters

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