The Integrated Ocean Observing System
IOOS is an organization of systems that routinely and continuously provides quality controlled data and information on current and future states of the
oceans
The ocean (also the sea or the world ocean) is the body of salt water that covers approximately 70.8% of the surface of Earth and contains 97% of Earth's water. An ocean can also refer to any of the large bodies of water into which the worl ...
and
Great Lakes
The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes in the mid-east region of North America that connect to the Atlantic Ocean via the Saint Lawrence River. There are five lakes ...
from the global scale of ocean basins to local scales of
coast
The coast, also known as the coastline or seashore, is defined as the area where land meets the ocean, or as a line that forms the boundary between the land and the coastline. The Earth has around of coastline. Coasts are important zones in n ...
al
ecosystem
An ecosystem (or ecological system) consists of all the organisms and the physical environment with which they interact. These biotic and abiotic components are linked together through nutrient cycles and energy flows. Energy enters the syste ...
s. It is a multidisciplinary system designed to provide data in forms and at rates required by decision makers to address seven societal goals.
IOOS is developing as a multi-scale system that incorporates two, interdependent components, a global ocean component, called the
Global Ocean Observing System, with an emphasis on ocean-basin scale observations and a coastal component that focuses on local to Large Marine Ecosystem (LME) scales.
Large Marine Ecosystems (LMEs) in U.S. coastal waters and IOOS Regional Associations.
Many of IOOS' component regional systems are being dismantled for lack of federal funding, including the Gulf of Maine Ocean Observing Syste
GoMOOS. This has resulted in the loss of long term data sets and information used by Coast Guard search and rescue operations.
Regional associations
The coastal component consists of Regional Coastal Ocean Observing Systems (RCOOSs) nested in a National Backbone of coastal observations. From a coastal perspective, the global ocean component is critical for providing data and information on basin scale forcings (e.g.,
ENSO events), as well as providing the data and information necessary to run coastal models (such as storm surge models).
IOOS coastal components
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* Alaska Ocean Observing System
AOOS
* Central California Ocean Observing System
CeNCOOS
* Great Lakes Observing System
GLOS
* Gulf of Maine Ocean Observing System
GoMOOS
* Gulf of Mexico Coastal Ocean Observing System
GCOOS
* Pacific Islands Ocean Observing System
PacIOOS
* Mid-Atlantic Coastal Ocean Observing Regional Association
MACOORA
* Northwest Association of Networked Ocean Observing Systems
NANOOS
* Southern California Coastal Ocean Observing System
SCCOOS
* Southeast Coastal Ocean Observing Regional Association
SECOORA
* Caribbean Integrated Ocean Observing System
CarICOOS
See also
* GOOS
The Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS) is a global system for sustained observations of the ocean comprising the oceanographic component of the Global Earth Observing System of Systems (GEOSS). GOOS is administrated by the Intergovernmental Ocea ...
* Global Earth Observing System of Systems (GEOSS)
* Ocean acoustic tomography
* Argo (oceanography)
Argo is an international program that uses profiling floats to observe temperature, salinity, currents, and, recently, bio-optical properties in the Earth's oceans; it has been operational since the early 2000s. The real-time data it provides is ...
* Alliance for Coastal Technologies
Established in 2000, the Alliance for Coastal Technologies (ACT) is a NOAA-funded partnership of research institutions, resource managers, and private sector companies dedicated to fostering the development and adoption of effective and reliable s ...
* Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009
The Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 (, ) is a land management law passed in the 111th United States Congress and signed into law by President Barack Obama on March 30, 2009. The bill designates millions of acres in the US as protected a ...
(authorizing legislation for IOOS)
References
{{reflist
External links
Monterey Accelerated Research System (MARS)Regional AssociationsCoastal Ocean Observing SystemSocial & Economic Benefits of IOOS
from "NOAA Socioeconomics" website initiative
Rutgers University RU27 through the IOOS - Smithsonian Ocean Portal
Oceanography
Earth observation projects
Oceanographic organizations