The ocean is key to life on our planet, and oceanography – the scientific study of the ocean – lies at the heart of understanding climate impacts. It is the interplay between ocean dynamics and the structure of coastlines – we are all familiar with the issue of sea level rise or recent extreme events such as Hurricane Helen and the resulting storm surge – that create major hazards.
“Projections for 2100 show that what is currently considered a once every 100-year storm surge event could now occur as frequently as every ten years – if not annually,” says oceanographer Nadia Pinardi, when talking at the annual EGI conference – an international infrastructure providing advanced computing and data analysis services for research and innovation. “We must create a legacy of science that can effectively tackle urgent issues like these and use oceanography to assess coastal risks, which is central to advancing community resilience.”
Pinardi introduced CoastPredict, one of 40 programs within the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030). As part of the Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS), CoastPredict aims to integrate real-time observational data with predictive models to provide actionable solutions for managing short-term risks while planning long-term mitigation strategies.
These systems will eventually support advanced tools that rely on innovative solutions such as machine learning-based forecasting and analysis, and transform how communities and policymakers respond to and prepare for coastal hazards across the globe.
“One of the major gaps we face as researchers is making the digital ocean accessible,” says Pinardi, about the fact that, although there is a lot of information and data being generated, the people that need critical information on coastal hazards the most struggle to access or use it easily. For this reason, seamless data access, particularly for coastal communities that are at risk, is a top priority for researchers such as Pinardi.
From threats to solutions
The role of science in investigating the interplay between oceans and coastlines doesn’t just involve identifying risks but also finding and developing adequate solutions. In this regard, there is a growing need to expand digital twins so that they can include complex and innovative elements such as nature-based solutions, which are increasingly recognized as a viable alternative to grey infrastructure for coastal protection.
In Italy, CMCC led studies on the role of seagrass meadows as an effective solution to reducing wave energy – using an ocean Digital Twin technology which showed that seagrass could reduce bottom current velocity by up to 50% and wave height by up to 20% – has helped inform future construction of green infrastructure. The key is to then take the approach used to find local solutions on a global scale, to develop sustainable – and often nature-based alternatives – for coastal protection.
Finding solutions requires integrating diverse coastal threats – which can range from tsunamis to marine heatwaves, harmful algal blooms and sea level rise – into a cohesive framework for evaluation and management. In this way researchers are recasting problems in terms of multi-hazard risks.
GlobalCoast: From local research to global solutions
Within the CoastPredict program, part of the solution to revolutionizing the way we observe, forecast, and prepare for multi-hazard coastal risks revolves around expanding cloud-based computing and infrastructure. In a demonstration of how a central framework for the coordination and practical implementation of the CoastPredict program works, the GlobalCoast initiative brings together users and scientists at pilot sites with integrated observing systems.
The Global Coast Pilot Sites survey conducted from July to October 2023 identified 130 pilot sites across 64 countries, involving 270 institutions. Source: CoastPredict
“We are in the process of designing an innovative cloud computing infrastructure for GlobalCoast, so that we can create globally replicable solutions and services,” says Pinardi about the project.
Crucial to the success of the initiative is a collaborative approach between the public and private sectors, establishing memorandums of understanding and working towards developing cloud systems that will make data – both generated locally and from external sources – accessible to all stakeholders.
The cloud system will focus on three pillars: real-time observation; routine multiscale prediction; and customized applications, including digital twins. The objective is to steer away from simply downscaling climate data for coasts, but rather identify key users for the 130 GlobalCoast sites – including local and regional authorities, management agencies, Marine Protected Areas, national weather and ocean forecast centers, the research community, national agencies, monitoring directives and frameworks, and sectors like aquaculture and mariculture – to create a GlobalCoast platform where all new information created by CoastPredict will be stored.
Equal access to all
Overcoming the technical barriers that limit access to information in the Global South is also a primary concern, especially as climate extremes affect these regions disproportionately.
“The Global South is missing a lot of computational resources compared to areas like the Mediterranean or the North Sea,” explains Pinardi, who believes that implementing new models and providing extensive training is part of the solution.
“Our goal is to create a cloud system, which will essentially be a federation of cloud systems, enabling global connectivity and fostering public-private collaboration based on cloud data,” says Pinardi. “We are also introducing solutions like citizen science sensors, which are low-cost and highly efficient. These sensors will be deployed in areas where they are most needed.”
Prototypes have already been developed for use in Georgia, on the USA’s East Coast, and include the use of an innovative model that extends to rivers to create a river-ocean continuum with no artificial boundaries. The result has been the development of an early warning system for hurricanes and storm surges and that could prove to be effective in downscaling global climate scenarios to the coastal level.
Other applications include oil spill pollution applications, with a defined hazard index and a general principle for classifying coastlines based on their risk, which helps determine the impact of an oil release in any of the specified locations.
Taking these developments and applying them around the world, including in the Global South, is a key area of future development and a vital component in ensuring climate justice.
The ocean we want
As coastal regions face increasing threats from climate change, initiatives like CoastPredict offer hope for a more resilient future. By bridging the gap between science and practical application, and making crucial data more accessible, CoastPredict can help transform approaches to coastal management and protection.
“We need to be realistic and not set wrong expectations. If someone talks about creating a Digital Twin with vegetation, morphological changes and blue carbon storage assessment on the coast, that is likely too far off for now. This is a complex issue, and our approach with CoastPredict is to address things incrementally, which is key for coastal modeling,” says Pinardi.
The goal at CoastPredict is to push the accessibility limit of High-Performance Computing resources, and then involve local communities in producing data that will be stored on the cloud. This capacity is already available today, and in two to three years, the necessary computational data production systems – allowing for observation, collection, and modeling – will be fully in place.
“The next step will be to integrate the cloud with HPC systems, which is crucial for the success of this project. The convergence of these technologies is key, and I’m hopeful that this will be achieved,” concludes Pinardi.
This article is based on the presentation given by Prof. Nadia Pinardi at EGI2024.
