Hood, Maria

Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, UNESCO, 1, rue Miollis, 75732 Paris Cedex 15, France, Tel: +33 (0) 1-45-68-40-28, Fax: +33 (0) 1-45-68-58-12, E-mail: m.hood@unesco.org

A pilot project of the SCOR-IOC Advisory Panel on Ocean CO₂ and the IGBP-IHDP-WCRP Global Carbon Project

The International Ocean Carbon Coordination Project

Three key scientific questions relevant to the ocean’s role in the global carbon cycle arise from current policy-related issues: (i) How large are present-day oceanic carbon sources and sinks, where do they operate, and what processes are controlling them? (ii) How will oceanic carbon sources and sinks behave in the future under higher atmospheric CO₂ concentrations and a possibly altered climate and ocean circulation? (iii) How will we assess our forecasts of future oceanic sink behaviour and thereby determine the effectiveness of any deliberate mitigation activities? Many nations are now moving ahead with plans for large-scale ocean carbon observations. Many of these national and regional projects are similar and have been designed to be complimentary to projects in other countries, but there is an immediate need for global-scale coordination of these ocean carbon observations. There is also an urgent need to critically assess the overall program of planned observations in order to ensure that the results, when combined, will indeed meet the requirements of the research community. Only through a coordinated ocean sampling programme and improved, basic scientific understanding of the ocean carbon cycle will the overall goal of skilful predictions of future atmospheric CO₂ be attained.

Recognizing the need for international coordination of ocean carbon observations, the SCOR-IOC Advisory Panel on Ocean CO₂ and the IGBP-IHDP-WCRP Global Carbon Project have initiated a collaborative project to provide: information about current and planned ocean carbon programs; coordination for national, regional, and international observations; joint planning workshops, optimisation of resources, and maximum sharing and use of data and information. The poster will outline results from the first international workshop and plans for upcoming intercomparions experiments, data workshops, and projects.