GEO-CAPE Ocean Color Observations: Utilization for Applications/Operations

Menghua Wang and Paul DiGiacomo NOAA/NESDIS Center for Satellite Applications and Research

GEO-CAPE Review15 November 2010

NASA HQ, Washington D.C.

NOAA Ocean and Coastal Ecosystem Interests & Observing Needs

• It is part of NOAA’s responsibility to help manage society’s use of ocean and coastal ecosystems, sustain natural resources and ecosystem health and services, and protect public health under several legislative & executive mandates, e.g.,

The Coastal Zone Management ActCoral Reef Protection Executive Order/Coral Reef Conservation Act The Clean Water Act The Harmful Algal Bloom and Hypoxia Research & Control ActThe Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management

Reauthorization Act The Marine Mammal Protection Act The National Coastal Monitoring Act The National Marine Sanctuaries Act

• Satellite ocean color data, products and imagery are important sources of information to help fulfill these and other mandates and needs and to optimize use and protection of coastal and ocean resources.

• However, there are significant gaps in existing and planned capabilities…..

Images of MODIS ocean color (left) and GOES SST (right) for 18 Sept. 2005 showing the potential improvement in coverage provided by geostationary observations. Images courtesy of NOAA’s West Coast CoastWatch node (http://coastwatch.pfel.noaa.gov). MODIS-Aqua data courtesy of NASA GSFC.

Temporal Resolution ComparisonTemporal Resolution Comparison

Increased temporal resolution from geostationary ocean color will greatly increase data coverage in persistently cloudy areas

Increased temporal resolution from geostationary ocean color will greatly increase data coverage in persistently cloudy areas

Coastal applications that GEO-CAPE could potentially support:

• Monitor and assess water quality and clarity; track dynamic ocean features• Detect, monitor, and predict the location and/or impacts of hazardous

materials, conditions such as harmful algal blooms, sewage spills, oil spills, urban/stormwater runoff, hypoxia/anoxia, eutrophication et al.• Appraise health of shallow water corals and other coastal habitats; improve habitat mapping and characterization• Enhance the development and implementation of new and improved

products for fisheries and integrated ecosystem assessments• Better understand the habitat used by large pelagic animals that are tracked with electronic tags, including describing longer term trends• Quantify the response of marine ecosystems to both short-term events

and climate variability/change (e.g., ocean warming, acidification)• Assess variability in phytoplankton biomass and productivity and associated

forcing for an improved understanding of coastal carbon cycle• Initialize, evaluate and validate output of coupled ocean-ecosystem models• Direct research cruises based on real time ocean features and habitat

NOAA Ocean and Coastal Ecosystem Interests & Observing Needs

GEO-CAPE would support NOAA’s National Ocean Service (NOS), National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), Oceanic and Atmospheric Research (OAR),National Weather Service (NWS), as well as the supporting NESDIS efforts.

NOAA/NOS - http://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/hab/

Harmful Algal Blooms – Operational Monitoring and Forecasting

Gulf of Mexico: South Florida

Higher spatial resolution crucial for monitoring of complex coastal waters: Regional water quality applications

Courtesy Bob Arnone, NRL

MODIS (250 m) MODIS (1 km)

CyanobacteriaLandsat “true color”

Lake Erie, courtesy OhioView

Spectral shape around “red edge” MERIS

Bloom - negative 681-shape

No Bloom positive 681 shape

SeaWiFS & MODIS

Band locations

MODIS only band

Wynne et al., 2008; IJRS

665 681 709

Utility of SWIR Bands in Turbid Coastal Waters

Comparison:

MODIS-derived chl-a usingexisting standard as well asnew method using NIR-SWIR algorithm (Wang & Shi,

2007)

US East Coast (panels a-c)China East Coast (panels d-f)

Significance: MODIS-derived chlorophyll-a data are significantly improved using the new atmospheric correction techniques for turbid coastal waters, e.g. Chesapeake & Hangzhou Bays.

Also see Wang, 2007; Wang et al., 2007 et al.

MODIS250 mimageof spill04/25/10

Deep Water Horizon Oil Spill: True color imagery from MODIS et al. was invaluable

COSMO-SkyMed VVENVISAT VVRADARSAT-1 HH

ALOS VV © JAXA, 2010 TERRA MODISDaily Composite Product 6/9/10

Multiple Passes per Day Aided Mapping the Entire Extent of the Spill

Characterizing Habitat Characterizing Habitat

NOAA/NMFS/SWFSC PFEL

Loggerhead turtle tracks along the Transitional Zone Chlorophyll Front (TZCF) in the N. Pacific during Feb. ‘01

The TZCF is an important foraging ground for a number of commercial and protected species.

Interannual variability in its location has been tied to the reproductive success of endangered monk seal pups. Polovina et al., Fish. Ocean., 2004NOAA/NMFS/PIFSC

SSH

Chlorophyll

Chlorophyll Frontal Product: upcoming NOAA operational product

Supports Ecosystem-Based Fisheries Management

Expanded Future OCR Applications & Operations

• Creation of habitat suitability maps - establishing boundaries of marinesanctuaries; managing commercially and recreationally important living marine resources; directing in situ sampling efforts, and locating targeted organisms such as Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs).

• Ecological prediction - forecasting year-class survival or growth rate of aspecies based on the timing of the spring phytoplankton bloom; initialisingand validating results of numerical ecological models; improving ecologicalforecasts through data assimilation; and nowcasting or forecasting the fateand transport of pollutants and pathogens.

• Extended use for climate change and impact assessments - to better estimate the spatio-temporal distribution of the air-sea CO2 flux and ocean acidification, especially in the coastal zone where riverine inputs and productive filaments can degrade the accuracy of estimates based only on sea surface temperature and scatterometer-derived wind speeds; providing data on the long term changes of surface biomass in response to climate change and other human activities.

• All will benefit from GEO-CAPE ocean color radiometry data…..

(IOCCG Report #7: Why Ocean Colour?)

Summary & Future Directions

• NOAA is presently utilizing NASA and commercial ocean color observations (MODIS-Aqua, SeaWiFS) on an operational basis supporting various user needs.

• Continuation of the ongoing successful efforts to transition ocean color R&D capabilities into applications/operations is crucial to meet NOAA

goals; in this context, GEO-CAPE represents an exciting opportunity to provide

significantly improved data & derived information in support of user needs and requirements.

• Spatial resolution of 300 m (or better), temporal revisits on the order of 1 to

3 hours (or better), and enhanced spectral coverage/resolution are required for a variety of coastal applications.

• A constellation of geostationary ocean color imagers would be desirable to provide broader global coverage.

• Geostationary ocean color observations from GEO-CAPE would be of great interest to NOAA and other coastal scientists/users and would provide enhanced support for numerous research, applications, & operational activities.

Back-Up Slides

Vertical Migration, example with Heterocapsa

Annual bloom, dinoflagellate not toxic in Chesapeake Bay

w/Shipboard validationTyler and Stumpf, RSE 1988

morning

morning

afternoon

Marine debris collects within the North PacificSubtropical Convergence Zone

Pichel et al., Marine Pollution Bulletin, 2007

Warrick et al., CSR, 2007

Satellite Observations of Stormwater Runoff Plumes

Nezlin et al., ECSS, 2008

• Runoff plumes are dynamic, episodic features, and can move 20-40 km/day• Cloud cover limits their observation

Plume

Non-Plume