Breakout Session

02: Ocean and Coastal Hypoxia and Climate Change

Coordinator: Ken Denman, School of Earth and Ocean Sciences, University of Victoria

Moderator: Robert J. Diaz, Virginia Institute of Marine Science, College of William and Mary

Discussants:

1. Donald F. Boesch, President, University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science - How to reduce the effects of climate and anthropoegnic factors on spreading dead zones: Policies and realities.
   
2. Holly Greening, Executive Director, Tampa Bay Estuary Program - Tampa Bay recovery and the role of policy and management.
   
3. W. Michael Kemp, Professor, University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Horn Point Laboratory - How systems respond to nutrient loading and physical controls.
4. Ivan Zavadsky, Sr. Water Resources Management Specialist, Global Environment Facilit - Restoration of the Danube River and Black Sea
5. Porfirio Alvarez-Torres, Chief Technical Advisor, Gulf of Mexico Large Marine Ecosystem, United Nations Industrial Development Organization - Gulf of Mexico

Summary: 

In the subtropical open ocean, subsurface (200-400m depths) oxygen concentrations have been decreasing for several decades over wide areas of the ocean. Mid latitude ocean regions such as the North Pacific also appear to be experiencing similar decreases. As surface temperatures and stratification continue to increase with a changing climate, these trends are expected to continue. World wide, coastal environments appear to be experiencing increasing incidences of hypoxia (very low oxygen concentrations that result in stress or death of marine animals) , and the locations of these events correlate with human settlement. Recently in the US, persistent 'dead zones' of very low oxygen that have received much media coverage have occurred in the Gulf of Mexico off the Mississippi delta and along the coast of Oregon. Other areas, such as parts of Chesapeake Bay, also routinely suffer from hypoxic events, usually during summer periods. There is general agreement that the frequency and severity of these events are increasing and that they are associated with human activities including climate change.

This session will include several speakers with expertise on hypoxia and its causes. The objectives of the session include:

• Providing a scientific basis for understanding the causes of and dynamics regulating hypoxic events, and how climate change is expected to change their form and likelihood.
• Identifying factors – coastal geography, oceanography, weather, types of nearby human activities, etc. - that increase the likelihood of hypoxic events occurring, and when they are most likely to occur.
  
• Exploring methodologies for predicting hypoxic events including monitoring requirements
• Discussion of coastal management options – harbor design, outflows, etc. – that could avoid and mitigate hypoxic events.

Outcomes:

• Scientific understanding of hypoxia drivers and sound management approaches to reducing hypoxia:
  • Providing a scientific basis for understanding the causes of and dynamics regulating hypoxic events, and how climate change is expected to change their form and likelihood.
    
  •  Identifying factors – coastal geography, oceanography, weather, types of human activities, etc. - that increase the likelihood of hypoxic events occurring, and when they are most likely to occur.
    
  • Exploring methodologies for predicting hypoxic events including monitoring requirements and management actions that have lead to reductions in hypoxia and improvements in ecosystem functioning.
    
  • Management options that could avoid and mitigate hypoxic events.
•  Recommendation and a plan for establishing multijurisdictional coordinating groups for monitoring environmental variables that would provide early warning of the onset of hypoxia and likelihood of spreading to adjacent areas (east coast, Gulf of Mexico, and west coast groups needed).
• Recommendation and suggested mechanisms for regional groups to explore how to implement international 'nutrient reduction program' at the local level.
• Recommend specific scientific research aimed at identifying mechanisms whereby open ocean trends in decreasing subsurface dissolved oxygen can change the likelihood of outbreaks of coastal hypoxia in different regions.

Resulting Recommendations:

DRAFT  RECOMMENDATIONS – Prepared by breakout groups and subject to review. These recommendations are the result of group processes and do not necessarily represent that positions of NCSE, which served as the enabler of the process that generated the recommendations.

Task 1.     USDA, Army Corps of Engineers and other federal entities should alter their subsidy systems away from practices that worsen water quality.

Task 2.    Local and regional planners should facilitate storm water management and develop better knowledge on how activities within watersheds impact receiving waters.

Task 3.Federal, state, NGOs, and foundations should encourage environmental literacy.

Task 4.The Army Corps of Engineers, states, and other entities should restore and mitigate wetlands and floodplains, including through public-private partnerships.

Task 5. Federal agencies should enhance and increase water quality monitoring.

Task 6.    Congress should develop long-term energy policies that include environmental and economic costs and benefits of degraded water quality.