Application of collected data
Presentations at the DBCP Technical Workshop
Chennai, India, 18-19 October 2004


Theme 2: Operations

NOAA’s Office of Climate Observation
Diane Stanitski, Michael Johnson, Sidney Thurston, (Office of Climate Observation, NOAA)

ABSTRACT: 

The NOAA Office of Climate Observation (OCO) contributes to the implementation of the global ocean observing system for climate. OCO-sponsored projects are predominately U.S. contributions to global networks coordinated through the implementation panels of the Joint WMO/IOC Technical Commission for Oceanography and Marine Meteorology (JCOMM). The OCO promotes a "system" approach to effective international organization of complementary in situ, satellite, data, and modeling components of climate observation. 

An Observing System Monitoring Center (OSMC) is currently being developed at OCO as a decision support facility reporting the current and historical status of globally distributed networks. The OSMC is designed to supplement JCOMMOPS in making additional system status information available to NOAA, national and international partners through the OCO website (www.oco.noaa.gov). One developing outreach effort, supported through the OSMC, is the Adopt A Drifter Program, enabling teachers and students from partnering U.S. and international schools to jointly adopt and analyze information about their drifter and other components of the observing system. 

The initial global ocean system design is nearly 48% complete and the OCO continues to support enhancement of that system by the NOAA labs and centers. The next steps for NOAA include expansion of the existing global networks and extension of some networks into the polar regions and Indian Ocean. Partnerships are critical and all of NOAA’s contributions to the international system are managed in cooperation with JCOMM.