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CSU Marine Equipment and Infrastructure Renewal
The coastal economy of California accounts for an estimated $42 billion in annual revenues. This coastal economy includes all aspects of economic activity from maritime transport and fishing to coastal tourism and the industries touched by these businesses. Thus, the health of the California economy is directly tied to the health of the coastal zone and the sustainability of activities that take place there. California’s coastal and marine areas face a number of economic, environmental and technological challenges that require innovative solutions. The California State University Council on Ocean Affairs, Science and Technology (COAST) has been created to focus the extensive coastal and marine research facilities and marine science research and education programs maintained by more than twenty CSU campuses. COAST is designed to address issues including, but not limited to, global climate change; responsible natural resource management and hazards mitigation; ocean and coastal policies; and the use of new and emerging technologies. COAST provides a platform to communicate the societal and environmental issues and scientific findings of research in the coastal zone to the government, private industry and the public throughout California.
A critical element of COAST is the CSU statewide coastal environmental data collection network, which provides real-time oceanographic and meteorological data for education, research and public use. The data from the network benefit a multitude of users from students at elementary, undergraduate and graduate levels, to state and federal research scientists and environmental policy makers. CSU’s current coastal environmental data collection network consists of 17 stations at which water depth, temperature, and salinity are collected and 5 meteorological stations at which air temperature, pressure, humidity and wind speed and direction are collected. These parameters comprise an excellent core suite of data from which many important oceanographic and meteorological phenomena can be inferred. The data are made available to the educational, scientific and public communities in near real time, and synthesized products have been used by scientists, government agencies, and the private sector, particularly the commercial aquaculture community. But much more can be done.
Funding requested would leverage existing efforts and enable the collection of additional measurements that can provide vitally important signals of California’s ocean and coastal ecosystem health.
Of the CSU’s 23 campuses, over half are near the coast, and almost all of them, regardless of location, offer marine-related instruction. The CSU has extensive but aging marine research equipment, infrastructure and data management systems that need to be updated and standardized throughout the CSU to promote large-scale data acquisition and dissemination. Currently, 10 CSU campuses formally participate in the coastal data collection network and for the most part, data generated are used locally. Individual CSU marine researchers have established important data collections of marine biological, chemical, and geological data that are currently not easily shared with other researchers or policy makers. With additional financial resources, the suite of variables collected at each site in the environmental monitoring network will be standardized and expanded, and the number of operational sites and participating campuses will be significantly increased, particularly in areas with dense human populations and marine environmental degradation. The data management systems will also be upgraded to significantly improve data transmission and dissemination throughout the CSU as well as the state. Through a nested array of computer servers COAST will be able to provide a single data portal for all of the network’s data. This will promote use of data and information from the entire network in classes at any CSU campus and in public educational programs carried out by ocean aquariums and centers. These data will also be provided to local, state, and federal agencies. Given the prominence of CSU’s role in educating California’s K-12 teachers (more than 60% of California’s teachers receive their credentials at CSU) investments in building an upgraded data management system for coastal data will also yield dividends in terms of possible impact on K-12 science instruction.
The CSU is requesting $2.5 million in NOAA funds, which would be used on equipment to standardize and increase the number of parameters monitored throughout the COAST environmental data collection network, and for related organizational costs. Funding would support marine research and education at CSU Bakersfield, CSU Channel Islands, CSU Dominguez Hills, CSU East Bay, CSU Fresno, CSU Fullerton, Humboldt State University, CSU Long Beach, CSU Los Angeles, California Maritime Academy, CSU Monterey Bay, CSU Northridge, Cal Poly Pomona, CSU Sacramento, CSU San Bernardino, San Diego State University, San Francisco State University, San Jose State University, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, CSU San Marcos, Sonoma State University, and CSU Stanislaus.
Additional information:
Jim Gelb, Assistant Vice Chancellor
CSU Office of Federal Relations
(202) 434-8060
Dr. Newell "Toby" Garfield, Director
Romberg Tiburon Center- SFSU
(415) 338-3713
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