Testing a New Approach to Long-term Salinity Measurements
OCCI Funded Project: 2007
Abstract
A
fundamental question in climate change science is whether the global water
cycle will accelerate with increasing temperatures. Since most of the water cycle occurs unmonitored
over the oceans, a key indication of a changing water cycle can be found in
trends in the surface salinity distribution.Salinity is greatly under-sampled at present, and we propose to remedy
this deficit with deployment of new WHOI-developed technology to make long-term
salinity measurements from surface drifters.We plan to use this proof of concept to catalyze a commitment on the
part of NOAA to instrument the surface drifters of the global drifter program with
salinity sensors. This will generate new
and unprecedented monitoring capabilities for salinity and enable the first
truly global studies of the water cycle.It will be especially valuable in high latitude regions of the North
Atlantic where planned satellite remote sensing
technology will be ineffective.