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Pacific Coastal Ecology Branch: Research Overview
Citation:
Nelson, Walt. Pacific Coastal Ecology Branch: Research Overview. Presented at Presentation to Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Sequim, WA, May 06, 2013.
Impact/Purpose:
PCEB/WED has an MOU with Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Marine Sciences Laboratory, Sequim, Washington. As part of a discussion of how additional collaborative efforts might be developed, Walt Nelson, Branch Chief of PCEB presented an overview of current research efforts at PCEB. The talk describes research on water quality criteria under the SSWR program, marine species at risk from climate change research under the ACE program, and estuarine ecosystem goods and services research under the SHC program.
Description:
The Pacific Coastal Ecology Branch, Newport, Oregon is part of the Western Ecology Division of the National Health and Environmental Effects Research Laboratory of the U.S. EPA. The Branch conducts research and provides scientific technical support to Headquarters and Regional Offices in support of the Agency mission. The current research program supports three Strategic Research Plans: Safe and Sustainable Waters (SSWR), Air, Climate and Energy (ACE); and Sustainable and Healthy Communities (SHC). Research for SSWR is focused on development of tools to assist in the development of numeric nutrient criteria for estuarine waters of the Pacific Northwest. ACE related research will develop a database and set of decision rules for determination of marine species at risk from the effects of global climate change in the Pacific region. Research under SHC will help characterize the ecosystem goods and services (EGS) production and benefit functions that link changes in biophysical features to changes in the well-being of human populations in coastal communities. Work is particularly focused on estimating uncertainty, scalability, and transferability of estuarine EGS models.