Coordinated by: CARBOOCEAN Integrated ProjectContract No (GOCE) Global Change and Ecosystems Summary on consolidated report for year 1

Recommendations: In the 2 nd annual report, more details need to be provided on: (a) measurement and calibration of VOS data especially on the commercial ships (Core Theme 1); (b) unforeseen changes in personnel (e.g. Core Theme 3). A situation with VOS programme requires monitoring by the project coordinator and Scientific Steering Committee; A discussion of consistency of modelling approaches for marine biogeochemistry (Core Themes 3 to 5) is recommended on 2 nd annual meeting; The project web site requires some improvements, PUBLISHABLE RESULTS ; The 2 nd annual report could be additionally reviewed by North American scientists actively involved into assessment of current oceanic CO 2 uptake, especially in Atlantic.

Recommendations part 2: Further: A review of feasibility of the main project target – reduction in the present uncertainties in the net annual air-sea CO 2 fluxes - could be done during the next stage (see appendix A) There are rather limited plans set out for non scientific activities such as training and dissemination. However given the very excellent and useful activities described in the 1 st year report and the management structures in place to keep these activities running, this is simply a shortcoming of this report and not a conscious scaling back on the good work carried out already. Do you identify any conflicts or evidence of underperforming partners, lack of commitment or change of interest of any partners? Do you recommend any changes in responsibilities? The only concern is related to workpackage 13 (Regional assessment for the West-Mediterranean). which might be simply due to a report which is not well written. The situation here should however be monitored.

Recommendations part 3: International Collaboration in particular with the US: This is a very important section. Since Europe has chosen to invest such a large amount of its Marine environmental budget on this one project, it is really important that this work is seen as a flagship project committed to understanding major global environmental issues. Such work must be, and indeed from this report, seems to be coordinated with and appreciated by our North American colleagues. To receive a valuable feedback from the North American scientists, we suggest that the 2nd annual report will be additionally reviewed by one of US or Canadian colleagues actively involved into assessment of the oceanic carbon uptake.

Recommendations part 4: Significant and on-going efforts have been made to reach the general public via the media in a variety of different ways. The most important of these are via TV. Have any efforts been made to suggest to any television companies to produce a scientific documentary such as a ‘BBC-Horizon’ programme based on CARBOOCEAN. It would be better for them to take shots of work on ships etc to include in such a programme. There is an impressive list of publications in scientific journals which have been published, in press or submitted. Obviously at this stage most of these are data collected before the project started and represent useful and relevant background data for the project. The real proof of the success of CARBOOCEAN will come later in the project when the models are run and the data synthesised into new understandings. At that time however the authors of these reports should no longer feel it necessary to list individually also all the posters presented at international meetings. ACKNOWLEDGE CARBOOCEAN IN ALL PUBLICATIONS AND POSTERS!!

Recommendations part 5: Have the contractors disseminated project results and information as foreseen by the contract and the plan for dissemination and use of knowledge (publications, conferences…)? This is proceeding satisfactorily. However at this stage in the contract there is not much in the way of ‘new’ data to disseminate. Web site of the project is in a good shape but some improvements are required (see attachment B). Name (s) of the reviewer(s): Michael Krom, Victor Brovkin Date: 07 April 2006

General comments on the project targets: The target of CARBOOCEAN IP is quite ambitious: to reduce the present uncertainties in the quantification of net annual air-sea CO 2 fluxes by a factor of 2 for the world ocean and by a factor of 4 for the Atlantic Ocean. The project summary does not include reference values of the present uncertainties, but seemingly they are from IPCC TAR report or from the other recent synthesis publications. The first annual report – as well as the project description and implementation plan for the project months – does not provide a convincing proof that this drastic reduction of the uncertainties will be achieved at the end of the project, but presumably this will be discussed during the next project phases. The reviewers suggest that the feasibility of the project target should be closely monitored by the Scientific Steering Committee and discussed during the second annual meeting of the project. If appropriate, the target could be reformulated in qualitative terms, e.g. “to reduce the uncertainties as much as possible”. Even a 30% reduction in uncertainty (confirmed by several independent methods) is a very substantial achievement. Besides, such a substantial reduction in uncertainty is a politically important issue which requires recognition of international scientific community. The reviewers suggest stronger coordination and cooperation with North American colleagues. In particular, the second annual report could be additionally reviewed by North American scientists.

General comments on model diversity: Several models of marine biological processes are used within the project. This diversity guarantees that advances in marine biogeochemical modelling achieved in different groups will not be lost. At the same time, the difference in model approaches within CARBOOCEAN could be a source of substantial uncertainty in simulated air-sea CO 2 fluxes. For example, a difference in air-sea CO2 flux in 2060 in North Atlantic between two versions of the same model - DGOM with 4 or 5 PFTs - is quite substantial (Annual report, page 23). For models based on different parameterisations of marine biology, the regional difference in fluxes might be even more drastic. Is there any way to constrain the model structure from the observation data? Reviewers recommend keeping a good balance between (i) the development towards more complex model parameterisations and (ii) a progress towards the project target - reduction in uncertainty. A discussion of consistency of modelling approaches for marine biogeochemistry (Core Themes 3 to 5) is recommended on 2nd annual meeting.

Website: PUBLISHABLE RESULTS NEEDED! Project findings (e.g. reduced N. Atlantic CO2 uptake) could be highlighted on the website. UNCERTAINTY REFERENCE NEEDED The project summary does not contain reference (present-day) uncertainties (see general comments). This is a bit confusing.