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Integrated Ocean Mapping
Integrated Ocean Mapping
Background
 Less
than 10% of the 3.4 million square nautical miles of the US
Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) has been mapped with current
technology, and less than 5% has been mapped in high resolution.
Within this area are the ecosystems and maritime resources
NOAA is expected to manage or monitor comprehensively and
cooperatively.
Today,
NOAA's Office of Coast Survey (OCS), our
nation's leader in maintaining nautical charts for safe navigation,
professionally maps our ocean floor with
emphasis on coastal areas to develop charts for safe navigation.
Thus, only a portion of our maritime environment is being
surveyed and explored. Within NOAA, a push for integrated
ocean mapping is underway, which combines the knowledge and
resources of OCS with the needs and capabilities of the rest
of NOAA's marine scientists and researchers.
A
primary product of exploration is new and improved maps. These
maps differ from nautical charts by characterizing the ocean
regions and documenting more than the physical environment.
NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration places
great emphasis on collecting data representing multiple facets
of the ocean environment including mapping the physical, biological,
geological, chemical, and archaeological aspects of the ocean.
These data will provide new knowledge that is necessary for
comprehensively characterizing our entire marine environment
from top to bottom and throughout the EEZ, and this information
will serve as the foundation for new ocean science and exploration.
Given the critical need for detailed maps of the ocean for
science, policy and management, NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration
places a high priority on new mapping endeavors.
High
resolution bathymetric mapping is a major component of several
other significant research programs within NOAA such as the
NOAA's Undersea Research Program (NURP) and
NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL).
NURP also supports various other mapping initiatives such
as comprehensive mapping of benthic habitats within NOAA's
National Marine Sanctuary Program, and PMEL supports a major
tsunami hazard assessment program within
OAR to mitigate hazards to the west coast of the US, Hawaii,
and Alaska. In addition, NOAA's Great Lakes Environmental
Research Laboratory (GLERL) teamed with NOAA's National
Geophysical Data Center (NGDC) and the Canadian Hydrographic
Service to merge U.S. and Canadian historical sounding data
to create improved resolution bathymetric maps and
data sets for the Great Lakes.
Why is mapping our ocean important?
 Many
programs and offices throughout NOAA are mandated to survey
ocean areas and prepare maps of hydrography, living marine
resources, essential fish habitats, coral
communities, hydrothermal vents, gas seeps, and marine archaeology
sites. However, these surveys are often conducted as separate
efforts, making it difficult to obtain, organize, and process
the data collected in order to better understand how areas
function as an ecosystem. Comprehensive coordinated mapping
activities will better characterize the marine environments
NOAA is tasked to protect, and will provide researchers a
baseline for determining future management needs.
A combined integrated ocean mapping strategy will eliminate the segregation of the strongest mapping expertise in NOAA, the Office of Coast Survey, and combine that activity with the emerging needs of other programs. This investment will facilitate an important national effort to map our national resources in the sea, and provide complete information for stewardship and management of the ecosystems that we seek to define and protect.
By coordinating these activities under a single enterprise, NOAA looks to combine sensors on single platforms and conduct multiple surveys at one time. This activity is directly related to maximizing NOAA resources in survey areas, avoiding redundant research, and fostering emergent technologies and applications.
Future Interest in Mapping
Integrated
ocean mapping will require coordination with NOAA research
projects using NOAA or NOAA-contracted vessels consisting
of sonar technology for bathymetry and habitat characterization,
mid-water multibeam for pelagic resource mapping, and low
frequency towed source survey for geological mapping. Additionally,
this level of effort would begin with an objective of completing
the mapping of the US continental shelf area and important
ocean features, focusing on areas under US jurisdiction but
including other areas that are unknown or poorly known.
In
addition to aligning mapping efforts internally, NOAA is continuing
to look externally for integrated ocean mapping support. A
major component beyond NOAA's inventory of expertise is a
marine geology capability to map and define
geological features and resources. This deficiency may be
filled with the coordinated assistance from other federal
agencies, such as NOAA's long time partnership with the US
Geological Survey (USGS).
Furthermore,
NOAA anticipates contracting for existing and emerging capabilities
in ROV, HOV, and AUV systems,
for vessels within NOAA's fleet and the many academic and
private platforms NOAA uses annually. These methods provide
for conducting surveys at a detailed resolution, and for filming
the areas as a means to verify survey data. This would further
define the role for industry in ocean exploration
and science, and sustain NOAA's involvement with the latest
commercial ocean technology.
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