1. The Innovative Coastal-Ocean Observing Network (ICON)
The Monterey Bay Element
of the
National Ocean Partnership Program
NOPP was created by Congress through the National Ocean Partnership Act (NOPA) to foster innovative partnering in marine research and technology development.
NOPP projects each represent a partnership between Government, Academia, and Private Industry.
The ICON project is a two-year program at $1.2M per year.

2. THE PARTNERS Naval Postgraduate School (NPS)
Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI)
California State University at Monterey Bay (CSUMB)
The University of Southern Mississippi (USM)
The University of Michigan (UM)
HOBI Labs
CODAR Ocean Sensors Ltd. (COS)
The Naval Research Laboratory (NRL)
POINTS OF CONTACT:
1. NPS: Dr. Jeffrey Paduan, ,
2. MBARI: Dr. Francisco Chavez, ,
3. CSUMB: Dr. Dan Fernandez, ,
4. USM: Dr. Igor Shulman, ,
5. UM: Dr. John Vesecky, ,
6. HOBI: Dr. Robert Maffione, ,
7. COS: Dr. Don Barrick, ,
8. NRL: Dr. John Kindle, ,

3. An Innovative Coastal Ocean
Observing Network (ICON)
PROGRAM ELEMENTS
Sea Surface Temperature
Ocean Color / Productivity
Surface Currents
Subsurface Currents
IUSS Reutilization
Meteorology
Ocean Forecasting
ABOUT THE FIGURE:
This figure shows the elements of the observational array to be deployed during the ICON field program. The view is offshore Monterey Bay, with the various equipment locations overlaid on a satellite sea surface temperature image from the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer on 3 Nov
1. Surface current vectors from the CODAR HF radar systems are shown
2. M1-M4 indicate the locations of the four surface buoy measuring current, marine optics, temperature and salinity, wind speed and direction, and atmospheric pressure.
3. The heavy black line is the boundary of the high-resolution numerical model domain to be used for assimilating the surface current vectors and other information.
4. The larger scale (NRL) model includes the entire west coast.

4. THE PARTNERSHIP WILL: Make Observations of Critical Ocean Parameters
Retrieve Data in Near-Real Time
Assimilate the Data Into Predictive Models
Forecast Ocean Conditions
Focus has been placed on the coastal ocean because so much of our interaction with the oceans takes place within a 100 km of the shoreline.
Fisheries, recreation, oil and gas exploration, transportation all occur here. Military initiatives are increasingly conducted in the coastal ocean. Weather along the coastline is strongly influenced by ocean conditions within 100 km of shore, and by the interactions of storms with the land-sea interface.
Despite these obvious requirements to understand and predict coastal ocean conditions, it is very difficult to do so accurately. The complexity of the air-land-sea interface means you must measure properties—such as currents, temperatures, and light absorption—over very short distances.
ICON addresses these issues by attempting to combine a number of new measurement techniques with a numerical model of the coastal ocean. Similar models exist for the atmosphere for which much more data is available, but ocean models have waited for new technologies to provide sufficient real-time data sources.

5. FOR THE BENEFIT OF: Sanctuary Management Fisheries Management
Littoral Warfare / National Security
Wave and Weather Forecasting
Many government agencies, military forces, corporations, and individuals operate routinely in the coastal ocean. Furthermore, the ecosystems in these areas sustain important fisheries and tourism industries.
ICON is developing a capability to monitor and model coastal ocean conditions to improve both real-time and climatological predictions.
As examples, we expect products such as the following to result from ICON and other NOPP projets:
Real-time displays of ocean currents for navigation and hazardous spill containment. High-resolution, three-dimensional current, temperature, and available nutrient fields for accurate ecological modeling of upwelling systems.