Final RFI_CRW Product Support.pdf

Executive Summary The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is seeking sources and surveying vendor capabilities via this Request for information (RFI) regarding professional services for the

NOAA Coral Reef Watch (CRW) program in support of coral reef management. This support may include, but not limited to, maintaining and improving existing CRW satellite-based products;

supporting the development, implementation, and subsequent maintenance of new products; and supporting the development of scientific papers.

Background 1 Program Overview and Context

NOAA’s mission is to understand and predict changes in climate, Earth, atmosphere, oceans and coasts, and space weather to share that knowledge and information with scientists, practitioners and decision-makers, and the public for the protection of life and property as the Nation’s authoritative source for environmental data.

1.1 NESDIS Overview

The National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS) supports NOAA’s mission of Science, Service, and Stewardship through our satellite missions, data centers, data and information products and services. It is an end-to-end responsibility that underpins NOAA’s value to the Nation. The United States depends on NOAA to provide satellite data and imagery for meteorological forecasts, space weather warnings and alerts, and emergency services to support continuity of government. NESDIS is responsible for the collection and provision of the critical satellite observations of Earth and the Earth/Sun system, and other essential environmental information needed for disaster preparedness, all hazards response and recovery and the protection of the Nation’s critical infrastructure and natural resources. These products and information enable services used in preparation for events that impact our climate, weather, oceans, daily lives and national safety and provide essential information for national, regional and local planners and officials.

1.2 NOAA Coral Reef Conservation Program

The NOAA Coral Reef Conservation Program (CRCP) was established in 2000 by the Coral Reef Conservation Act to protect, conserve, and restore the nation's coral reefs by maintaining healthy ecosystem functions. NOAA CRCP focuses on four main pillars of work:

● Increase resilience to climate change;

● Reduce land-based sources of pollution;

● Improve fisheries' sustainability; and

● Restore viable coral populations

NOAA CRCP brings together expertise from across NOAA for a multidisciplinary approach to studying coral reef ecosystems to inform more effective management. NOAA CRCP works closely with NOAA scientists in the National Ocean Service, National Marine Fisheries Service, Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research, and NESDIS.

1.3 Coral Reef Watch program

For more than 20 years, NOAA CRW has been using remote sensing, modeled, and in situ data to operate a decision support system to help resource managers, scientific researchers, decision makers, in-water monitoring networks, and other stakeholders around the world prepare for and https://coralreefwatch.noaa.gov/index.php respond to coral reef ecosystem stressors, predominantly resulting from climate change and warming of the Earth's oceans. Offering the world's only global early-warning system of coral reef ecosystem environmental changes, NOAA CRW remotely monitors conditions that can cause coral bleaching, disease, and mortality. CRW delivers information and early warnings in near real-time to our extensive and diverse user community, and uses operational climate forecasts to provide outlooks of heat stress on coral reefs worldwide.

2 Coral Reef Watch Support Scope

NOAA CRW requires support for the maintenance and development of its satellite-based products that are an essential component for coral reef management. This support involves the maintenance and improvements to the existing CRW products:

● CoralTemp v3.1;

● CRW Heat Stress product suite v3.1;

● Light Stress Damage product suite;

● Sea Surface Temperature (SST) Anomaly product;

● Marine Heatwave Watch product;

● Coral Disease Outbreak Risk product suite;

● Thermal History product suite;

● Wave-driven Flooding on Reef-lined Coasts Early warning system (WaveFoRCE); and

● Global Coral Bleaching Observation database.

CRW also requires support in the development, implementation and subsequent maintenance of new products (defined within the document) including a:

● Thermal Refugia product;

● Heat Stress Projections product suite;

● Background Sea Temperature product suite; and a

● Global Coral Bleaching Event product suite.

Finally, CRW requires data products and analyses to facilitate development of at least two peer reviewed scientific papers demonstrating the use of SST and Degree Heating Week (DHW) products, and assessing limitations to the DHW product. 1

2.1 Existing CRW Products

2.1.1 CoralTemp

CoralTemp is the only satellite-based 0.5 degree resolution sea surface temperature (SST) product with internal consistency from 1985 to present available to the public. Most CRW products are based on SST anomalies and as such, the historic data used for the creation of climatologies must be related to the near-real time (NRT) data for an accurate anomaly to be calculated.

2.1.2 Heat Stress Product Suite

The CRW Heat Stress product suite provides tools to assess heat stress leading to coral bleaching and mortality on coral reefs. It comprises three components, the Maximum Monthly Mean (MMM) climatology, HotSpot (HS), and Degree Heating Week (DHW). The MMM defines the heat stress

1 DHW is a satellite-based measure of accumulated heat stress that quantifies thermal anomalies in excess of the maximum monthly mean SST over a 12 week period.

threshold for corals, the HS is a measure of daily heat stress, and the DHW is a measure of accumulated heat stress.

2.1.3 Light Stress Damage Product Suite

The Light Stress Damage (LSD) product is a product that seeks to provide a more accurate prediction of coral bleaching than the DHW product. It is currently a coral physiology-based algorithm that combines light and temperature into an LSD index that is aimed at outperforming DHW when it comes to predicting coral bleaching. It consists of a Light Stress-only product, a Light & Temperature

Stress product, and an LSD Index.

2.1.4 SST Anomaly Product

The SST Anomaly (SSTA) product provides daily SST Anomalies for all ocean pixels at a spatial resolution of 0.05 degrees.

2.1.5 Marine Heatwave Watch Product

The Marine Heatwave Watch (MHW) product is a categorization of a daily SST anomaly so as to simplify the presentation of SST anomalies for users.

2.1.6 Coral Disease Outbreak Risk Product Suite

The Coral Disease Outbreak Risk product suite is a collection of tools that provide users with an understanding of the current risk of a coral disease outbreak for Hawaii and the Great Barrier Reef.

2.1.7 Thermal History Product Suite

The Thermal History Product Suite consists of a collection of 27 different metrics. The outputs consist of data as netCDF files and images.

2.1.8 The Wave-driven Flooding on Reef-lined Coasts Early warning system

The Wave-driven Flooding on Reef-lined Coasts Early warning system (WaveFoRCE) seeks to provide marine flood forecasts to all fringing coral reef-lined coasts in the world (in particular the UN Small

Island Developing States). WaveFoRCE is a joint project between NOAA, USGS and Deltares. CRW is the lead program for the NOAA portion of the project, which includes the development and delivery of the back-end of the system (all wave and sea surface height forecasts), the production of the flood forecasts, and the development of the front-end of the system in the form of a web site with fit-for-purpose tools that provide appropriate information about flood events.

2.1.9 Global Coral Bleaching Observation Database

CRW maintains the world’s largest database of in situ bleaching observations. This is used in conjunction with, and to assess the various CRW bleaching-related products.

2.2 Future CRW Products

2.2.1 Thermal Refugia Product

The CRW Thermal Refugia product will be a global product that uses the DHW product to identify coral reefs with thermal refugia.

2.2.2 Heat Stress Projections Product Suite

Heat Stress Projections Product Suite is a product that CRW will develop. The aim is to provide DHW projections out to 2099 at 0.05 degree resolution, for individual coral reef pixels throughout the world, with prioritization given to US reefs.

2.2.3 Background Sea Temperature Product Suite

CRW data show that coral heat stress events are becoming more frequent. This is likely because as global warming progresses, the background sea temperatures (BST) are increasing such that for many areas, the sea temperature leading into the summer months is warmer than ever, and in some cases, very close to the thermal threshold of corals, meaning that it takes little in situ heating during summer to push corals beyond their thermal limits, resulting in more frequent and more severe bleaching events. As a result, a CRW requirement is the development of a product that will provide hindcast and nowcast BST data for all ocean 0.05 degree pixels on a daily basis. The product suite shall include a BST product, BST climatology, BST anomaly product and BST index.

2.2.4 Global Coral Bleaching Event Product Suite

CRW requires development of a product suite that will track and understand patterns associated with global coral bleaching events. The product suite will consist of ocean basin metrics for tracking the proportion of reefs that have passed the thermal threshold for bleaching. These metrics will then be combined into global products, from which a Global Coral Bleaching Event (GCBE) Index will be derived. These metrics will include the proportion of reefs with bleaching-level heat stress over the past 365 days, the length of time (including start and end) of a GCBE, the total extent and the intensity of the event, and a GCBE Index.

3 Near-Future Support Requirements

CRW requires assistance for the following activities related to the above products. Where computer programming is required, this must be performed in Python. All development of products must take place within the NESDIS Common Cloud Framework (NCCF), as on premise development will not be possible.

3.1 Light Stress Damage Product Suite

The production of the experimental LSD product has been suspended since 2016, when the GOES Surface and Insolation Products (GSIP) were taken offline due to a change in satellites. GSIP is expected to be back on line by the end of 2024. Re-implementation of the entire LSD product suite is required as soon as the GSIP product is back online. This will require an updated global, light-only minimum Fv/Fm climatology to be recalculated for the period 1979 to present, per the published study about the LSD product.

Enhancements to the LSD algorithm are also required, and include:

● Inclusion of a recovery term to simulate recovery of algal symbionts after bleaching; and

● The development of a NRT satellite-based light attenuation term (KdPAR) over shallow coral reefs is needed so that LSD can be calculated at the depth of individual corals.

3.2 SST Anomaly Product & Marine Heatwave Watch Product

Currently SSTA and MHW products use different climatologies. CRW requires a new climatology that will unify these two products. The new climatology needs to retain much of the methodology of the MHW product, which follows accepted methodologies for the creation of MHW products, and yet is similar to the SSTA climatology such that the product will have minimal changes. This new climatology needs to be developed, tested and implemented so that the SSTA and MHW products are appropriately related.

3.3 Coral Disease Outbreak Risk Product Suite

Currently, the Coral Disease Outbreak Risk maps do not have the same look and feel as the other CRW products. CRW requires the development and implementation of updated Coral Disease Outbreak Risk maps for Hawaii and the Great Barrier Reef to ensure consistency with other CRW products.

Recently the Multi-Factor Coral Disease Forecast product completed development. CRW requires that the Multi-Factor Coral Disease Forecast be incorporated into the Coral Disease Outbreak Risk product suite.

3.4 Thermal History Product Suite

Currently, the Thermal History product suite maps do not have the same look and feel as the other CRW products. CRW requires the development and implementation of updated Thermal History product suite maps for all 27 metrics within the product suite.

There is some concern over the accuracy of the climatology used in the product suite. CRW therefore requires that the climatology be evaluated and if necessary, updated.

The Thermal History product suite requires updating with the previous year’s data every February.

3.5 Thermal Refugia Product

The CRW Thermal Refugia product will be a global product that aims to identify coral reef areas that may act as thermal refugia. CRW requires the categorization of reef pixels based on their historical exposure to bleaching-level heat stress to determine what reefs may be buffered from climate change impacts.

3.6 Wave-driven Flooding on Reef-lined Coasts Early warning system CRW has been developing a WaveFoRCE demonstration website (waveforce.online). It is currently very basic and does not have a significant amount of much needed functionality. The web site as well as aspects of the WaveFoRCE product needs to be developed, including:

● Replace the existing web site with a cloud-enabled storefront web portal that has modern functionality as well as a modern look and feel (e.g. Drupal);

● Update the new WaveFoRCE demo website by creating an entry point to the Flood Forecast Viewer, that includes a new map-based location selector with pan and zoom capabilities, and appropriate text;

● On the new WaveFoRCE demo website, complete the Flood Forecast Viewer by including historic Flood Event and Storm Tracker pages;

● On the historic Storm Tracker animation page, add a flood level graph, connecting the animation and graph, and indicate the flooding stage of an animated wave event using graph markers;

● On the information page, provide a demonstration of WaveFoRCE forecasting for the Roi Namur 20 January, 2024 flood event;

● Update the Flood Forecast Viewer landing page so that instead of depicting a historic flood event, it provides near-real-time forecasts for Roi Namur;

● Include a color coded countdown meter with the near-real-time forecasts; and

● Add new near-real-time demonstration sites including Guam, US Virgin Islands, Florida, American Samoa, the Marshall Islands, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Saipan, CNMI.

It has become evident that WaveWatch III often underestimates significant wave heights. This bias is different for each wave event. CRW requires the development and demonstration of a calibration method, using satellite measurements of significant wave height, which will cover forecasts out to 3 days before the flood event.

3.7 Heat Stress Projections Product Suite

CRW requires the development of projections of DHW out to 2099 for every 0.05 degree coral reef pixel within the US-jurisdiction coral reefs.

This will require the following:

● A methodology to accurately downscale CMIP-6 outputs to a 0.05 degree coral reef pixel;

● A methodology for creating DHW from CMIP-6 outputs; and

● A methodology for condensing the multiple outputs from the multitude of CMIP-6 models and hence simplifying the outputs for managers and users.

3.8 Background Sea Temperature Product Suite

Derive a methodology for the provision of a satellite-based Background Sea Temperature (BST) product. Produce an experimental NRT product and hindcast back to 1985, so as to provide a background sea temperature product suite that spans 1985 to present for all ocean pixels. The product suite shall include a background sea temperature product, background sea temperature climatology, background sea temperature anomaly product and background sea temperature index, the methodologies for which require development.

3.9 Global Coral Bleaching Event Product Suite

CRW requires the development of methodologies and then implementation of products that provide:

the proportion of reefs with bleaching-level heat stress over the past 365 days for each oceanic basin and the globe as a whole, the length of time (including start and end) of a GCBE, the total extent and intensity of the event for each oceanic basin and the globe as a whole, and a GCBE Index.

3.10 Global Coral Bleaching Observation Database

Maintaining the Global Coral Bleaching Observation Database involves updating it with new observations obtained from social media and mainstream media, which all require verification by contacting the source of the information. Observations should also be acquired from CRW collaborators and partners. These data require quality control protocols to ensure that data are of sufficient high standard and relate to heat stress.