Value Chain Overview
Value Chain Overview
TRICUSO’S Contribution to the Ocean Carbon Value Chain
TRICUSO’s main objective is to innovate every level of the observation value chain. Why is this necessary?
Uptake of ocean carbon is of key importance to understand climate change and to provide future projections to make effective decisions regarding climate action. We need more observations and improved data quality.
Both the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) through the Global Climate Observing System Implementation Plan (GCOS IP) and the World Meteorological Organization through the Global Greenhouse Gas Watch (WMO G3W) have issued mandates to monitor surface CO2. These must be supported by the research community.
From Bottom to Top
The Value Chain Levels Explained
Measurements
Measurements are collected from multiple research efforts and various ocean platforms (ships and floats, etc.). Currently, there is some coordination between organisations within the observing community, but it is not enough. TRICUSO is supporting SOCONET as an observing network to enhance coordination among organisations and networks observing carbon.
Quality control and data products
Data from the observations are collected, quality controlled and made available in a harmonised data product. For surface ocean carbon this data product is called the Surface Ocean CO2 Atlas (SOCAT) and it is updated annually.
Mapping and modelling
Scientists use the Surface Ocean CO2 Atlas (SOCAT) data products in combination with satellite data of mostly temperature, salinity and chlorophyll and apply mapping methods to extrapolate observations to full global coverage using artificial intelligence methods. This step is necessary since the global coverage of pCO2 data is typically less than 2% (of 1°x1° boxes).
Assessments
The estimates of air-sea CO2 flux (coming from the data processing in the previous level) are used to support scientific assessments, such as the IPCC reports and the annual Global Carbon Budget.
Policy advice
The assessment reports are typically presented at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Congress of the Parties (COP) meetings where they will ideally guide climate actions by the UNFCCC and its member states.
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This work was funded by the European Union under grant agreement no. 101188028. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Research Executive Agency (REA). Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.
