Sea Grant Programs and US EPA Long Island Sound Study Award $708,308 for Long Island Sound Research

Contacts:

Barbara Branca, New York Sea Grant, P: 631-632-6956, E: barbara.branca@stonybrook.edu

Peg VanPatten, Connecticut Sea Grant, P: 860-405-9141, E: peg.vanpatten@uconn.edu

Stony Brook, NY, March 19, 2013 - The Sea Grant programs of Connecticut and New York, with the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Long Island Sound Study program, announced today that they will fund research grants that will help efforts to improve water quality and adapt to climate change.  The two projects, totaling $708,308, involve teams of researchers in three states, making it a truly collaborative effort.  

In one of the two-year projects researchers will estimate the risk of eutrophication for 50 embayments in the Long Island Sound region.  Jamie Vaudrey, Charles Yarish and Jang Kyun Kim from the University of Connecticut and Christopher Pickerell, and Lorne Brousseau from Cornell Cooperative Extension of Suffolk County, NY will use computer models to calculate estimates for dissolved nitrogen concentrations and freshwater flushing times for each embayment. They will also sample each embayment at dawn and slack tide during the summer hypoxia season and compare the results with existing field data.  An assessment of risk for each embayment, including potential impacts to food webs, will be prepared and distributed to coastal managers.
 
In another project, researchers will analyze historical trends back to the 1970s to project and manage Long Island Sound’s future.  The research team, led by Nickitas Georgas of Stevens Institute of Technology (working with Alan Blumberg and Philip Orton) will synthesize physical data collected for Long Island Sound and global climate change indices.  The computer model will first model backward in time, a process called “hindcasting.” Results will be compared to historic marine resources data from the CT Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (Penny Howell), and a high-resolution global climate model from NOAA’s Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory in Princeton NJ (Vincent Saba).  Finally, the computer model will look forward to simulate the effects of climate on Long Island Sound’s physical environment and living marine resources up to the year 2100. This multi-disciplinary approach to projecting conditions in the Sound for the rest of the 21st century is of great interest to both stakeholders and regional managers as they pursue management strategies in response to climate change.

“The information derived from these projects  will be  invaluable for managers dealing with critical issues affecting the health of the Sound,” said Mark Tedesco, director of EPA’s Long Island Sound Office in Stamford, CT, which manages the Long Island Sound Study.

“Long Island Sound is continually changing due to human impacts and these studies will help document these changes and predict future ones, helping to improve management,” said Jim Ammerman, Director of New York Sea Grant at Stony Brook University.

“It is exciting to see researchers from different institutions leverage their knowledge and expertise into multidisciplinary projects that will provide new information to better understand and manage Long Island Sound," said Sylvain De Guise, Director of Connecticut Sea Grant at the University of Connecticut.

The Long Island Sound Study Research Grant Program is conducted by the two Sea Grant programs. Connecticut Sea Grant, based at the University of Connecticut at Avery Point, and New York Sea Grant, based at Stony Brook University (SUNY), are part of the National Sea Grant College Program network, administered by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Sea Grant’s mission is to foster the conservation and wise use of our coastal and marine resources through research, outreach and education. Funding for the program is provided to the Sea Grant programs by EPA as part of the Long Island Sound Study, a cooperative effort between the EPA and the states of Connecticut and New York to restore and protect the Sound and its ecosystem.

More Info:

New York Sea Grant (NYSG), a cooperative program of Cornell University and the State University of New York, is one of 33 university-based programs under the National Sea Grant College Program (NSGCP) of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The NSGCP engages this network of the nation’s top universities in conducting scientific research, education, training and extension projects designed to foster science-based decisions about the use and conservation of our aquatic resources. Through its statewide network of integrated services, NYSG has been promoting coastal vitality, environmental sustainability, and citizen awareness about the State’s marine and Great Lakes resources since 1971.

For updates on Sea Grant activities: www.nyseagrant.org has RSS, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube links. NYSG also offers a free e-list sign up via www.nyseagrant.org/coastlines for NY Coastlines, its flagship publication, and Currents, its e-newsletter supplement, each distributed 3-4 times a year.