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Integrated Marine Protected Area Climate Tools (IMPACT) for Managers


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Objectives

The overall goal of this project is to develop climate tools for managers of Marine Protected areas in South Florida, in particular, the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary, Florida Reef Tract and Florida Bay, by informing them of 1) past climatological trends including seasonal cycles, averages, and extremes, 2) expected changes in coastal ecosystem conditions as a response to past and current climate, and 3) likely short-term scenarios involving system-wide climate impacts.  Project objectives include:

  • Identify and synthesize relevant archival datasets to establish a climatological baseline for the Florida Keys NMS and surrounding region, addressing long term behavior (e.g., averages, variability, extremes), using available data source providers, existing integration frameworks (IOOS), and data sharing principles supported by NOAA.
  • Provide a climate analysis integrating various data sources, platforms, and inputs to develop a local‐scale understanding of ecosystem‐critical responses to climate changes through conceptual and probabilistic modeling approaches.
  • Define relevant outputs in a format for assessment of climate impacts on ecosystem conditions, resources and habitats that will help automate the interpretation of both large-scale climate signals and real-time observational data in the field.
  • Provide critical climate information to support the development of skilled climate change predictions, risk and vulnerability assessments and management actions for coastal marine resources in South Florida.
Map of project areas – FKNMS, including Florida Reef Tract, Florida Bay. Source: FKNMS.
Map of project areas – FKNMS, including Florida Reef Tract, Florida Bay. Source: FKNMS.
Figure 1: IMPACT Project Framework illustrating work components, expected outcomes and time lines.
Figure 1: IMPACT Project Framework illustrating work components, expected outcomes and time lines.

Project Summary

The NOAA collaborative IMPACT project includes a multiagency, multidisciplinary partnership group to compile, assess, and evaluate regional to local climate information, and to integrate this information with ongoing coastal ocean observing, monitoring, and data access networks in the Florida Keys. The planned MPA site evaluation will provide critical satellite-derived, modeled, and in situ ocean and climate data products tools at appropriate scales and levels of interpretation for sanctuary management planning, and will serve as a prototype for evaluations in other networked MPAs. Planned products include a comprehensive set of interpreted satellite-derived climatologies (as input and guidance for climate scenarios development), operational monthly assessment reports to understand system-wide responses to climate changes, and a framework for integrating climate scenarios of ecosystem impacts (e.g. water quality, habitat) into the network of Marine Protected Areas.

Products & Services

Current and Future

  • One- pager and two-page Prospectus (October, 2009)
  • Preliminary Data inventory (December, 2009)
  • IMPACT Draft Work Plan
  • Comprehensive set of data climatologies and statistical summaries (January 2011)
  • Web-based discovery prototype (March 2011)
  • Derived data products, and tools (nowcasts, forecasts, bulletins) (January 2012)
Figure 2: The general conceptual model to convey our scientific understanding of how global patterns influence weather type and how weather types result in ecosystem responses and impacts. Conceptual models will be development in conjunction with probabilistic models in Climate Analyses.
Figure 2: The general conceptual model to convey our scientific understanding of how global patterns influence weather type and how weather types result in ecosystem responses and impacts. Conceptual models will be development in conjunction with probabilistic models in Climate Analyses.

Partners

Relevant Links

Time Frame

Planned for February 2010 – 2014

For More Information

Project Manager (COAST):
1305 East West Highway
SSMC-IV, N/SCI-1
Silver Spring, MD 20910
301-713-3028 x167


Project Manager (ONMS):
1305 East West Highway
SSMC-IV, N/SCI-1
Silver Spring, MD 20910
301-713-3125 x257


Project Manager (AOML):
4301 Rickenbacker Causeway
Miami, FL 33149
305-361-4396


Project Manager (NCDC):
151 Patton Avenue
Asheville, NC 28801-5001
828-271-4223