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Coastal Synthesis Objectives and Outcomes
The contribution of coastal margins to regional and global carbon budgets is not well understood, largely due to limited information about the magnitude, spatial distribution, and interannual variability of carbon sources and sinks in coastal waters. The Ocean Carbon & Biogeochemistry (OCB) Program has been collaborating with the North American Carbon Program (NACP) over the past two years to develop a Coastal Interim Synthesis Activity as part of the NACP Interim Synthesis activities, the goals of which are to bring together relevant observations, data, and modeling efforts in an effort to identify and quantify key sources, sinks, stocks, fluxes, and associated processes in the North American carbon budget.
The objective of the Coastal Interim Synthesis Activity is to stimulate the synthesis of observational and modeling results on carbon cycle fluxes and processes along the North American continental margins. This activity has been divided geographically into five regions:
- East Coast
- West Coast
- Gulf of Mexico
- Arctic
- Great Lakes
With support from the U.S. Carbon Cycle Science program and its affiliated agencies, this national activity is expected to yield opportunities for interested PIs to consider coordinated responses to agency research announcements as research and modeling needs and priorities are identified. To facilitate the level of coordination and collaboration required for such an extensive activity, regional leaders and members of the OCB and NACP offices are convening a community workshop.
We are pleased to announce the first Coastal Interim Synthesis workshop, which took place December 11-12, 2010, just before the 2010 Fall AGU meeting in San Francisco, CA.
The goals of this workshop were to gather active members of the coastal research community to:
- Identify existing datasets, publications and ongoing studies that could contribute to the development of regional coastal carbon budgets (and ultimately archived in a community database)
- Determine the fluxes and processes that should be included in regional carbon budgets and associated models to ensure consistency and inter-comparability
The final outcome of the Coastal Interim Synthesis Activity will be a science plan for coastal ocean carbon and related biogeochemical research that identifies knowledge gaps and ranks research priorities to guide relevant program (e.g., NACP, OCB, etc.) and agency activities and initiatives. Depending on community interest, we may also pursue a special issue on regional coastal carbon budgets and associated processes in a relevant journal. We anticipate a follow-on workshop in Summer 2011.
We gratefully acknowledge the support of NASA to convene this workshop.
Agenda
Download workshop agenda
The latest version of the agenda is linked here.
The workshop will begin with a series of plenary talks that address key coastal carbon budget processes, followed by breakout sessions, both by process (e.g., production and respiration, off-shelf transport, sediment processes, etc.) and by region, to address challenges and devise detailed strategies for developing and refining regional coastal carbon budgets.
Breakout Session Guidelines
For more information about the breakout sessions, please download the Breakout Guidelines.
Presentations and Materials from Workshop
SATURDAY DECEMBER 11 PLENARY TALKS
- Elizabeth Boyer presentation: Fluxes from the land to the water
- Larry Atkinson presentation: Continental shelf-open ocean exchange - For movie files from this presentation, please email hbenway@whoi.edu
- Chuck Hopkinson presentation: Coastal vegetative ecosystems
- Miguel Goni presentation: Sediment processes and fluxes
Links to NASA SeaWIFS animations by region (Atkinson's talk)
Global and North Atlantic:
http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003400/a003468/index.html
Global and North Pacific:
http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003400/a003471/index.html
Gulf of Mexico:
http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003500/a003518/index.html
West Coast:
http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003500/a003517/index.html
Northeast:
http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003500/a003515/index.html
Sea surface temperature:
http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003300/a003388/index.html
SUNDAY DECEMBER 12 PRESENTATIONS
- PROCESS BREAKOUT SUMMARIES
-River-estuary (T. Bianchi)
-Cross-shelf exchange (R. He)
-Sediment processes (B. Bergamaschi)
-Primary productivity and respiration (D. Munro)
-Air-sea exchange (J. Salisbury)
- REGIONAL BREAKOUT SUMMARIES
-East coast (W-J Cai)
-Gulf coast (P. Coble)
-West coast (L. Juranek)
-Arctic (H. Thomas)
-Great Lakes (H. Bootsma)
- DATA AND MODELING DISCUSSION
-Databases and web resources (P. Griffith)
Relevant links:
Handout: National approach to community modeling and database development for the OCB/NACP Interim Coastal Carbon Synthesis
North American Carbon Program (NACP) Projects
CDIAC Global Coastal Program
-Building a CDOM database (C. Osburn)
Relevant links:
Biological and Chemical Oceanography Data Management Office (BCO-DMO)
CDOM data set
-Building a model (G. McKinley)
Steering Committee
Members
Simone Alin, NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory
Heather Benway, OCB Project Office (WHOI)
Wei-Jun Cai, University of Georgia
Paula Coble, University of South Florida
Peter Griffith, NASA GSFC / Sigma Space Corp.
Steve Lohrenz, University of Southern Mississippi
Jeremy Mathis, University of Alaska Fairbanks
Galen McKinley, University of Wisconsin – Madison
Ray Najjar, The Pennsylvania State University
Mary Zawoysky, OCB Project Office (WHOI)
Participants
Click here for participant list.
Logistics
What We Will Be Covering
To maximize productivity, this workshop will be limited to ~50-75 participants. We have funds to cover the following:
- Meeting room space and A/V equipment
- Meals during the meeting: Starting with dinner on Saturday Dec. 11 (workshop begins after lunch) and going through lunch on Sunday Dec. 12 (workshop will adjourn Sun. afternoon and participants will be on their own for dinner)
- Given that we have a set budget for this meeting, we will offset participant hotel costs for this meeting at whatever level possible, depending on the number of participants and catering and meeting room costs. We recommend that workshop participants who are attending the AGU meeting make their hotel arrangements via the AGU housing reservation system (deadline: November 1) and we will reimburse hotel costs for this meeting (1-2 nights) at whatever level we can after the meeting. For those NOT attending AGU, please book your own hotel rooms.
Airport and Ground Transportation
The closest airport is San Francisco International Airport (SFO).
Ground transportation to/from San Francisco airport
- Super Shuttle (San Francisco/SFO)
SuperShuttle has extended a 15% discount on all services valid for travel dates between December 6-17,2010.
The discount code is PJDNV and your direct link is https://www.supershuttle.com/default.aspx?GC=PJDNV - The BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit)
- Other ground transportation options to/from downtown San Francisco
Workshop Venue
The workshop will be held at the Courtyard Marriott at 299 Second Street in San Francisco. This hotel is included in the AGU housing reservation system.
Related Information
Relevant Literature
Aufdenkampe, A.K., Mayorga, E., Raymond, P.A., Melack, J.M., Doney, S.C., Alin, S.R., Aalto, R.E., Yoo, K. (2011). Riverine coupling of biogeochemical cycles between land, oceans, and atmosphere. Front. Ecol. Environ. 9(1), 53–60, doi:10.1890/100014.
Bates, N. R., Mathis, J. T., and Jeffries, M. A. (2011). Air-sea CO2 fluxes on the Bering Sea shelf, Biogeosciences 8, 1237-1253, doi:10.5194/bg-8-1237-2011.
Cai, W.-J (2011). Estuarine and coastal ocean carbon paradox: CO2 sinks or sites of terrestrial carbon incineration? Ann. Rev. Mar. Sci. 3: 123-145
Cai, W. J., S. E. Lohrenz, (2010) The Mississippi River Plume and Adjacent Margin in the Gulf of Mexico, In: Carbon and nutrient fluxes in continental margins: a global synthesis (K. K. Liu, L. Atkinson, R. Quinones and L. Talaue-McManus, Eds.), Springer-Verlag, NY.
Coble, P. G., Robbins, L. L., Daly, K. L., Cai, W-J, Fennel, K., Lohrenz, S. E. (2010). A Preliminary Carbon Budget for the Gulf of Mexico. Fall 2010 issue of the OCB newsletter.
Hales, B., Wei-Jun Cai, B. Greg Mitchell, Christopher L. Sabine, and Oscar Schofield [eds.] (2008). North American Continental Margins: a synthesis and planning workshop. Report of the North American Continental Margins Working Group for the U.S. Carbon Cycle Scientific Group and Interagency Working Group. Washington, DC: U.S. Carbon Cycles Science Program.
Howarth, R., Chan, F., Conley, D.J., Garnier, J., Doney, S.C., Marino, R., Billen, G. (2011). Coupled biogeochemical cycles: eutrophication and hypoxia in temperate estuaries and coastal marine ecosystems. Front. Ecol. Environ. 9(1), 18–26, doi:10.1890/100008.
Jiang, L-Q, Cai, W-J, Wang, Y., Diaz, J., Yager, P. L., Hu, X. (2010). Pelagic community respiration on the continental shelf off Georgia, USA. Biogeochemistry 98, 101-113, DOI: 10.1007/s10533-009-9379-8 .
King, A.W., L. Dilling, G.P. Zimmerman, D.M. Fairman, R.A. Houghton, G. Marland, A.Z. Rose, and T.J. Wilbanks [eds.] (2008). The First State of the Carbon Cycle Report (SOCCR): The North American Carbon Budget and Implications for the Global Carbon Cycle. A Report by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program and the Subcommittee on Global Change Research. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Climatic Data Center, Asheville, NC, USA, 242 pp.
Laffoley, D.d’A. & Grimsditch, G. (eds). 2009. The management of natural coastal carbon sinks. IUCN, Gland, Switzerland. 53 pp.
Liu, K.-K., Atkinson, L., Quiñones, R., Talaue-McManus, L. (Eds.) (2010). Carbon and nutrient fluxes in continental margins: A global synthesis. Global Change - The IGBP Series ISSN 1619-2435, Springer-Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg., 744 pp.
Mathis, J. T., Bates, N. R. (2010). The Marine Carbon Cycle of the Arctic Ocean:
Some Thoughts About The Controls on Air-Sea CO2 Exchanges and Responses to Ocean Acidification. Article in Spring/Summer 2010 Issue of the OCB Newsletter.
McKinley, Galen, Noel Urban, Val Bennington, Darren Pilcher, and Cory McDonald. 2011. Preliminary Carbon Budgets for the Laurentian Great Lakes. Ocean Carbon and Biogeochemistry News Vol. 4, Number 2.
Murrell, M.C., Lehrter, J.C. (2010). Sediment and Lower Water Column Oxygen Consumption in the Seasonally Hypoxic Region of the Louisiana Continental Shelf. Estuaries and Coasts, DOI 10.1007/s12237-010-9351-9.
Najjar, R., Butman, D. E., Cai, W-J., Friedrichs, M. A. M., Kroeger, K. D., Mannino, A., Raymond, P. A., Salisbury, J., Vandemark, D. C., Vlahos, P. (2010). Carbon Budget for the Continental Shelf of the Eastern United States: A Preliminary Synthesis. Article in Winter 2010 Issue of the OCB Newsletter.
Osburn, Christopher L., Thomas S. Bianchi, Robert F. Chen, Paula G. Coble, Eurico J. D’Sa, Cyndy Chandler. 2011. Building a CDOM Database for a Coastal Carbon Synthesis Project. Ocean Carbon and Biogeochemistry News. Vol. 4, Number 1
Pennington, J.T., Castro, C.G., Collins, C.A., Evans, W.W. IV, Friederich, G.E., Michisaki, R.P., Chavez, F.P. (2009) The Northern and Central California Coastal Upwelling System, Chapter 2.2, In K.-K. Liu et al. (eds.), Carbon and Nutrient Fluxes in Continental Margins, Global Change – The IGBP Series, 25 DOI 10.1007/978-3-540-92735-2 2, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg, pp. 29-44.
Robbins, L.L., Coble, P.G., Clayton, T., Cai, W.-J. (2009). Terrestrial and Coastal Carbon Fluxes in the Gulf of Mexico Workshop, St. Petersburg, FL USA 6-8 May, 2008: USGS Open File Report 2009-1070, 80 p.
Sarmiento, J. L., and Wofsy, S. C. (1999). A U.S. carbon cycle science plan. Report of the Carbon and Climate Working Group for the U.S. Global Change Research Program. Washington, DC: U.S. Global Change Research Program.
Shih, Jhih-Shyang, Alexander, R.B., Smith, R.A., Boyer, E.W., Schwarz, G.E., and Chung, Susie, 2010, An initial SPARROW model of land use and in-stream controls on total organic carbon in streams of the conterminous United States: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 2010–1276, 22 p., available at http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2010/1276.
Web Resources
View/download presentations and posters from the session "The Linked Carbon and Water Cycles -- The Atmosphere- Land-Ocean Continuum"
