NOAA Ocean Acidification Program (OAP) Community Meeting

Topical Sessions Objectives

Each Topical Session will highlight different areas of OA research/efforts. Scientists across disciplines and regions will hear about the latest OAP-supported research efforts and findings. By the end of these sessions, attendees will better understand emerging hot topics and be able to identify collaborative opportunities around existing and new research to fill gaps in knowledge. Each session will reflect on diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility, and justice in OA research and our community.

Topical Session 1: Observing, Predicting and Attributing Change

This session will include projects that showcase the latest science on observing, predicting and attributing changes in our oceans and Great Lakes. What is currently being done? What challenges exist? Best practices for identifying trends and changes. Here by “change” - we mean any change - in chemistry or in biological/ecosystem level - that is a consequence of OA.

Topical Session 2: Technology Development: What does the future of OA science technology look like?

This session will focus on proven and new tools and techniques for monitoring OA, including  sensor technology, platforms (e.g., ships, moorings, floats, gliders); modeling techniques; AI and machine learning methodology.: What does the future of OA science technology look like?  For this session we are accepting abstracts that highlight the utility of new technology in OA science

Topical Session 3: Communication and Community Relationships with OA

This session will highlight key communication points for discussing how OA is connected throughout the ecosystem, including impacts on human communities. Exchange ideas on ways for educating and communicating about OA and engaging with human communities on OA monitoring, research and action.  This session will also discuss how to identify actionable steps that can increase adaptive capacity to OA including policy linkages and communication with resource managers and legislators.  For this session we are accepting abstracts that describe how to effectively communicate about OA using specific examples/case studies. 

Topical Session 4: Marine Carbon Dioxide Removal (mCDR)

This session will focus on different ocean CDR projects (e.g., ocean nutrient fertilization, artificial upwelling/downwelling, seaweed farming, Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement, Electrochemical processes, and ecosystem recovery). What is the current knowledge, efficacy, durability, scalability, and co-benefits of the different CDR approaches? What are the best practices and current gaps in observing and modeling technology supporting Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV)?  For this session we are accepting abstracts that address the above questions.

Topical Session 5: OA experiments:  the expansion of multi-stressor experiments and experimental best practices

The impact of climate change is multi-faceted, with ocean acidification being just one of the many environmental factors influencing ecosystem dynamics.  The synergetic impact of acidification, warming, changes in precipitation, stratification, etc. offer new stressors to aquatic systems leading to potential shifts in ecosystem structure and function.  While methods and approaches have been evolving over the last several decades, there is now a need to standardize experimental design to allow for intercomparison among studies.  This session will focus on laboratory and field based experiments which focus on multiple stressors, emerging experimental parameters to consider, and standardized strategies and tools. 

Topical Session 6: Regional Vulnerability Assessments

This session aims to inform the OA community about the regional vulnerability assessments funded by the OAP and the new report on regional vulnerability created by the US Interagency Working Group on Ocean Acidification (US IWG-OA). This session will include presentations from various RVA projects including project plans and progress, challenges encountered and results.