Richard Sanders is the coordinator of TRICUSO and its sister project OceanICU. At NORCE, he is Director of the Ocean Thematic Centre within the ICOS Research Infrastructure, and contributes to many programmes and initiatives, such as the WMO G3W Observation Task Force. In addition, he holds an honorary chair in Ocean Biogeochemistry at the University of Southampton.
In the game of ocean observation bingo, it’s fair to say Richard’s card is relatively full and yet somehow his capacity seemingly expands to accommodate new challenges. So, we thought the tide was in a good place to cast a few rounds of questions and learn a little more about Richard and his thoughts on TRICUSO as it hits its year two stride.
Round One: Don’t think, just answer
Your earliest memory of the Ocean? Swimming at the beach in Borth, West Wales
Favourite Ocean region? The Scotia Sea
First Research Vessel? James Clark Ross (now the Noosfera)
Your first undergraduate degree? Chemistry
From where? Nottingham
Round Two: Recollecting
When did you know you wanted to be a scientist and what was the early journey like?
It was the only thing I was any good at in school because it just came naturally. I was also really into the outdoors. After a pure chemistry degree, I decided to do something more environmental. I remember vividly sitting in the library at Nottingham looking at a book on oceanography I found. It was Chemical Oceanography by some guy called Wallace Broecker, who I subsequently discovered was probably the most famous living oceanographer in the field. It showed pictures of the vertical structure of the water column and I was just like wow, I didn’t know this even existed.
I also remember reading a thriller called Night of Error by Desmond Bagley about manganese nodules (mineral concretions on the sea floor) and my curiosity was sparked. So, I went to Southampton to do a Master’s – and I told Professor J. Dennis Burton about my interest in manganese nodules, I remember him vividly reaching into the desk drawer and getting a manganese nodule out for me to hold. After that I was hooked. I did my Master’s project in Bergen because I really liked the mountains and fjords and then after the usual round of soft money positions in Norwich learning how to be an oceanographer working on coastal nutrient cycling, I was hired onto the staff at NOC.
Do you have a favourite research cruise that stands out for you?
My first cruise was super memorable, flying through the whole Atlantic in the depths of winter, stopping at Ascension Island and seeing the James Clark Ross for the first time, the ship that was going to be home for the next six weeks. I remember spotting her from the top of one of the hills and thinking how small she looked. We boarded and sailed South, saw the ice edge in the Weddell Sea and ended up in Rio.
Other highlights include trips to the Crozet islands in 2004 to work on natural iron fertilisation and the first cruise I led to the PAP site. PAP is the Porcupine Abyssal Plain (named after HMS Porcupine). It’s in the North Atlantic and is a classic place for biological oceanography. This was the cruise that resulted in a pretty groundbreaking paper published in Nature: “Reconciliation of the carbon budget in the ocean’s twilight zone” that essentially balanced the mid water carbon budget.
Do you go to sea much these days? Is there anywhere you are eager to get back to?
Well, I don’t get to do as much sea time as I used to, but when I do, I love it. I’m hoping to go to sea in late 2027 with TRICUSO deployments, which will be in my favourite place – the eddy west of South Georgia where I worked in the past. I really don’t feel like I’ve completely scratched my polar itch – it’s such an important and beautiful place – I just want to keep going back.
Round Three: The Business of TRICUSO
TRICUSO had its first annual meeting recently in Bergen. How did you find it?
Well, I would say that we have made a strong start. If I look across the project, I can see that the work packages are delivering exciting results. We are seeing technological advancements with the wind sensor innovations on the Argo floats that have been deployed. And the team in Kiel at GEOMAR has been motoring ahead with understanding the performance of the OceanPackTM RACE system which will be installed on racing yachts. There was also a super exciting bonus with the instalment of this system on the Hans Hansson tourist vessel, so we’re getting pCO2 readings as she travels through the Antarctic region. This opportunity was seized at very short notice and with a new operator.
In other areas of the project, the team associated with optimal observing system design has also made a good start with the recruitment of new team members, and they’ve outlined a coherent plan. TRICUSO will be co-hosting a meeting at VLIZ in Ostend, Belgium this June to help pull together a set of observing system suggestions for the WMO to consider as they implement the Global Greenhouse Gas Watch (G3W).
Was there anything that really surprised you or interested you on a personal level?
I thought it was exciting that our consortium was joined by scientists from international programmes—busy people who were willing to give up their time and travel to Bergen in January from as far away as Cape Town and Tasmania, and the West Coast of the United States, as well as from around Europe. We learned a lot about what is going on amongst Southern Ocean observing initiatives through their insights and how TRICUSO can have the most impact within the environment. It was great to see how the tasks involved in engaging this community have matured, especially our ambition around SOCONET. We hosted its first steering committee meeting, following the Annual Meeting. I found it inspiring to have so many scientists working together to define a programme that will transform our ad hoc observing system into something more organised.
Is a unified approach the best way forward?
Yes. Measuring the global carbon cycle, particularly in the ocean, in what we call the ABNJ, (area beyond national jurisdiction), is kind of a collective shared problem. Nobody owns the open ocean or vast swathes of it. But we all benefit from the services it provides, and we need to understand how it works. So, you think to yourself: whose responsibility is it to take this on? And the answer is, of course, it’s a shared responsibility, which means we all must work together. This requires that we all have a full knowledge of what everybody is already doing. There’s a big project called Antarctica InSync that is attempting to bring together observing systems from around the world. And within TRICUSO, we are looking at how that’s operating and what’s going to happen within it and what we can contribute to its strategic planning.
Other than the strengthening of more unified approaches to ocean observation, what other shifts are you seeing?
We’re in the middle of seeing this transformation of the observing system in two different ways. One is moving away from this reliance on ships to the reliance on autonomy, and the other is moving away from this sort of bottom up, curiosity driven, research focused system to one that is composed both of that research element, but also a kind of a more operational, sustained, systematic observing of the global carbon cycle. And TRICUSO is kind of sitting in the middle of that whole thing, engaged in autonomy and with the activity to create this sustainable system.
One last question? What motivates your passion to keep going, to keep serving the community and the issues?
I would say it’s because biological oceanography is super interesting and really beautiful and because the climate crisis is so acute that we all must do what we can to help. I’m also motivated by the people I’ve met along the way.
The TRICUSO consortium in Bergen, Norway at the project’s first annual meeting.
Name: Richard Sanders
Work Package: WP1
Organisation: NORCE, Norway
