Building a Global Ocean Profile Database GSOP Quality Control Workshop June 12, 2013

Outline The size and shape of a global ocean profile database Data Archeology and Rescue Data flow into a global ocean profile database

3 World Ocean Database (WOD) A quality controlled collection of ocean profiles, plankton tow, and ship-based surface measurements from 1772-present.

4 Variables in WOD 1) temperature 2) salinity 3) oxygen 4) phosphate 5) nitrate 6) nitrate + nitrite 6) silicate 5) chlorophyll 6) pH 7) alkalinity 8) pCO 2 9) TCO 2 10) Plankton 11) CFCs 11, 12, and ) Tritium 13) Helium (noble gas) 14) ΔHe-3 (isotope) 15) ΔC-13 (isotope) 16) ΔC-14 (isotope) 17) Argon (noble gas) 18) Neon (noble gas) 19) O-18 (isotope) 20) Beam Attenuation Coefficient (transmissivity) Instrument types in WOD 1) Station Data (bottles, thermometers) 2) CTD 3) XBT 4) MBT 5) Towed CTD 6) Profiling Floats 7) Drifting buoy (thermistor chains) 8) Moored buoy (e.g., TAO, PIRATA TRITON) 9) Autonomous Pinniped (instrumented elephant seals) 10) Gliders Blue: Quality control beyond automatic checks

Growth of the World Ocean Database 5

WOD by Instrument Type 6

1934 : Nansen Cast Temperature Data During Peek of Different Observing Systems Red=Nansen Cast /CTD[1890s/1964] Light Blue=MBT [1939] Dark Blue=XBT [1967] Green=Argo float [2001] Orange=Tropical buoy [1984] 7

1934 : Nansen Cast 1960 : MBT Temperature Data During Peak of Different Observing Systems Red=Nansen Cast /CTD[1890s/1964] Light Blue=MBT [1939] Dark Blue=XBT [1967] Green=Argo float [2001] Orange=Tropical buoy [1984] 8

1934 : Nansen Cast 1960 : MBT 1985 : XBT Temperature Data During Peak of Different Observing Systems Red=Nansen Cast /CTD[1890s/1964] Light Blue=MBT [1939] Dark Blue=XBT [1967] Green=Argo float [2001] Orange=Tropical buoy [1984] 9

1934 : Nansen Cast 1960 : MBT 1985 : XBT 2009 : Argo Temperature Data During Peak of Different Observing Systems Red=Nansen Cast /CTD[1890s/1964] Light Blue=MBT [1939] Dark Blue=XBT [1967] Green=Argo float [2001] Orange=Tropical buoy [1984] 10

11 Measurements vs. Depth WOD05 Measurements (X10 5 )Measurements (X10 4 ) Silicate Chlorophyll

12 Measurements vs. Depth WOD13 Measurements (X10 5 )Measurements (X10 4 ) Depth (m)

13 World Ocean Database Contains contributions from national data centers, universities, special projects, fisheries, navies, government agencies, individual scientists, merchant ships etc. Data found on internet, index cards, glass slides, outdated computer media, published cruise reports, etc. Original data must be accessible in the NODC archive/permission must be obtained for all data

14 Data from universities, fisheries Left: Bottle data from Hokkaido University (Japan) ( ) Right: Temperature Data from US National Marine Fisheries ( )

15 Data from international projects Left: GEOSECS bottle and CTD data ( ) Right: WOCE CTD data ( )

16 Data Archeology and Rescue Cruise Reports found: Red/Yellow: Library of University of Tromso, Norway Blue: Public Library, St. Petersburg, Russia Green: Public Library, New York City, USA (in part)

Are there still data to be rescued? In a letter dated 11 May, 1990 from Lawrence Hall (Director of Ocean Programs, Sippican Inc.) to Greg Withee (director US NODC), it was noted that Sippican had manufactured > 4 million XBTs to date. In the World Ocean Database, there are 1.3 million XBT profiles which are from drops prior to the end of 1990.

Are there still data to be rescued? WOD09: 7,955 bottle/CTD casts in the Sea of Okhotsk WOD13: 14,264 bottle/CTD casts in the Sea of Okhotsk 6,309 casts added, mostly from the Russian Far East Institute Years for which data were added:

Gap Gap NODC database 1939 observations Figure 1 Data in the Barent Sea: Available in WOD vs. known observations [Figures courtesy of Igor Smolyar.] Source: Proceedings of the Polar Institute of Fisheries and Oceanography from the 1950s- 1960s. Are there still data to be rescued?

20 Argo/CoriolisGTSPP Delayed Mode Data NODC Permanent Archive [non-uniform Format] Near Real-Time Availability World Ocean Database Additional QC Uniform format Buoys PMEL/JAM Data quality information Not Always Publicly Accessible NODC Information Stream (Profile Data) Quarterly Updates of WOD

Argo data 2012: 132,244 profiles [Coriolis GDAC]

Tropical Moored Buoy Arrays TAO/TRITON – PIRATA – RAMA 33,012 daily means [PMEL]

Near-real time data from GTSPP: 2012 Green – XBT (14,775 casts) Red – CTD (12,549 casts) Blue - Pinniped (21,567 dives) Turquoise – Glider (7,430 half cycles)

Red: CCHDO – 164 CTDs Green: ICES – 7,254 CTD/bottle Black: TAO CTD – 59 CTDs Orange: SISMER (France) – 194 CTDs Blue [Atlantic/Medit]: AOML – 386 XBTs Blue [Pacific/Indian]: CSIRO – 162 CTDs Magenta: ISDM (Canada) – 181 CTDs Turquoise: CalCOFI – 75 CTDs Grey: WHOI Ice Buoy – 6,202 cycles Delayed-mode data for 2012 to date: 14,677 profiles

25 Examples of Delayed-mode data Updates to WOD World Ocean Database Quarterly Updates NOAA Northeast Fisheries CCHDO WHOI Ice Tethered Buoys ICES CalCOFI Japan Ocean Data Center CSIRO Line W INIDEP (Argentina) TAO maintenance cruises Blue – Quarterly Orange- Yearly Green - Irregular

26 Example of already aggregated data passed to WOD CLIVAR and Carbon Hydrographic Data Office (CCHDO) GO-SHIP WOCE BATS HOT CDIAC CARINA PACIFICA OceanSITES Other CLIVAR

27 Science and Data Community Convert Data to Common Format/Initial Quality Control Calculate Climatologies Secondary Quality Control Release Database With Quality Control Flags Scientific Research Post-release Quality Control Monthly database updates OCL/NODC MAKE DATA AVAILABLE Publish Results FEEDBACK LOOP

Data Dissemination: Yearly by instrument Geographically by instrument WODselect All updated quarterly Format: Native WOD format (compact ASCII) with conversion routines netCDF -> feeds into NODC Geoportal/THREDDS server Working now on subset dissemination through Geoportal

Relevant to Workshop Always more historical/recent data – are we setting up a framework for continued quality control or working with a static historical database? If continuous, at which stage of the data flow do we insert ourselves and in what manner? What data sets are we dealing with – how do we handle each data set (pinniped? moored buoy?) Is the WOD a proper vessel for this project, or is a different system necessary? How will data be disseminated?