NOAA IS EXPLORING NOW

Bidwell 13 (Allie Bidwell, Sept. 25, 2013, Scientists Release First Plan for National
Ocean Exploration Program,
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/09/25/scientists-release-first-plan-fornational-ocean-exploration-program)
More than three-quarters of what lies beneath the surface of the ocean is unknown, even to trained scientists and researchers .

Taking steps toward discovering what resources and information the seas hold, the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Aquarium of the Pacific
released on Wednesday a report that details plans to create the nation's first ocean
exploration program by the year 2020. The report stems from a national convening
of more than 100 federal agencies, nongovernmental organizations, nonprofit
organizations and private companies to discuss what components should make up a
national ocean exploration program and what will be needed to create it. "This is
the first time the explorers themselves came together and said, 'this is the kind of
program we want and this is what it's going to take, '" says Jerry Schubel, president and CEO of the
Aquarium of the Pacific, located in Long Beach, Calif. "That's very important, particularly when you put it in the context that the
world ocean is the largest single component of Earth's living infrastructure ... and less than 10 percent of it has ever been explored."
In order to create a comprehensive exploration program, Schubel says it will become increasingly important that federal and state
agencies form partnerships with other organizations, as it is unlikely that government funding for ocean exploration will increase in
the next few years. Additionally, Schubel says there was a consensus among those explorers and stakeholders who gathered in July
that participating organizations need to take advantage of technologies that are available and place a greater emphasis on public
engagement and citizen exploration utilizing the data that naturalists and nonscientists collect on their own. "In coastal areas at
least, given some of these new low-cost robots that are available, they could actually produce data that would help us understand
the nation's coastal environment," Schubel says. Expanding the nation's ocean exploration program could lead to more jobs, he
adds, and could also serve as an opportunity to engage children and adults in careers in science, technology, engineering and
mathematics, or STEM. "I think what we need to do as a nation is make STEM fields be seen by young people as exciting career
trajectories," Schubel says. "We need to reestablish the excitement of science and engineering, and I think ocean exploration gives
us a way to do that." Schubel says science centers, museums and aquariums can serve as training grounds to give children and
adults the opportunity to learn more about the ocean and what opportunities exist in STEM fields. "One thing that we can contribute
more than anything else is to let kids and families come to our institutions and play, explore, make mistakes, and ask silly questions
without being burdened down by the kinds of standards that our formal K-12 and K-14 schools have to live up to," Schubel says.
Conducting more data collection and exploration quests is also beneficial from an economic standpoint because explorers have the
potential to identify new resources, both renewable and nonrenewable. Having access to those materials, such as oils and minerals,
and being less dependent on other nations, Schubel says, could help improve national security. Each time explorers embark on a
mission to a new part of the ocean, they bring back more detailed information by mapping the sea floor and providing highresolution images of what exists, says David McKinnie, a senior advisor for NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration and Research and a
co-author of the report. On almost every expedition, he says, the scientists discover new species. In a trip to Indonesia in 2010, for
example, McKinnie says researchers discovered more than 50 new species of coral. "It's really a reflection of how unknown the
ocean is," McKinnie says. "Every time we go to a new place, we find something new, and something new about the ocean that's
important." And these expeditions can have important impacts not just for biological cataloging, but also for the environment,
McKinnie says. In a 2004 expedition in the Pacific Ocean, NOAA scientists identified a group of underwater volcanoes that were
"tremendous" sources of carbon dioxide, and thus contributed to increasing ocean acidification, McKinnie says. Research has shown
that when ocean waters become more acidic from absorbing carbon dioxide, they produce less of a gas that protects the Earth from
the sun's radiation and can amplify global warming. But until NOAA's expedition, no measures accounted for carbon dioxide
produced from underwater volcanoes. "It's not just bringing back pretty pictures," McKinnie says. "It's getting real results that
matter."