Posted on: Sunday, May 12, 2002
COMMENTARY
Oceans key to predicting global climate changes
By Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher Jr.
The U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy is taking stock of our nation's oceans and their effect on global climate.
The message I will deliver to the commission when it meets this week in Honolulu is that oceans play a key role in climate change. Climate change is a pressing international issue that requires improved scientific understanding and increased international cooperation.
Three weeks ago in Seoul, South Korea, the United States called on the 21 countries at the first Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation ocean-related ministerial meeting to support expansion of the rudimentary global observing system that is in place today. The APEC members agreed and issued a strong statement on the importance of that system.
Now, the international community must commit resources to make this a reality. The United States is doing its part. President Bush pledged to help developing nations implement components of this system, to help build understanding about their own regions and to share in global interests.
The administration also has increased financing of data-collection buoys, calling on other developed countries to do the same. The United States, the European Union, Japan and others are developing state-of-the-art modeling to improve the quality of predicting causes and consequences of climate change.
While the existing system offers an exciting array of technological marvels — sea-level gauges, ocean robots, data-collection floats that ride the currents, and more — there is still a pressing need for complete, sustained global observation system.
Weather is what we experience day to day. Climate affects weather patterns over a season or longer. The air we breathe and the sea washing our shores respect no national boundaries. Global pollution shows up in Antarctica's snow. Dust from the Africa's sandstorms show up in Florida's coral reefs.
Climate services will become as critical in this century as weather services in the last. Without the participation of every nation, we will have gaps in understanding.
Data may not only forewarn Africans about impending floods and drought but alert Americans that warm air and winds in that region may bring a season with more hurricanes. Buoys in the Pacific demonstrated the value of observing systems in seasonal climate forecasts when El Niņo's 1997-98 warmer-than-normal sea-surface temperatures triggered devastating effects around the world.
The effects could have been even worse if the buoy system hadn't provided the data to allow the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to issue an unprecedented six months' alert.
From temperature monitors at various depths in the Pacific Ocean, we have early indications that another El Niņo is brewing. With a relatively small investment in observing systems and prediction models, we will be able to save lives and hundreds of millions of dollars.
The United States already has much on the table. A realistic new yardstick will measure greenhouse gas emissions relative to economic activity. Goals have been set to reduce their intensity by 18 percent over the next decade. Achieving this cut beyond current forecasts in a cost-effective way will depend directly on a continuing global effort to monitor and apply sound science.
With the critical support of international partners, we will for the first time take the pulse of Mother Earth and build the detailed science base necessary to develop sound and fiscally wise public policy on climate change.
Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher Jr., USN (Ret.), is undersecretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere, and NOAA administrator. He will address the U.S. Commission of Ocean Policy, which meets tomorrow and Tuesday in Honolulu, on this issue.
