Coastal Upwelling and Climate in the California Current

Alongshore winds, through upwelling and transport, are the main force behind the rich marine ecosystem found in the California Upwelling Ecosystem and other Eastern Boundary Upwelling Systems. These winds, driven by large-scale atmospheric processes and enhanced at by coastal features, are largely impacted by climate. Ocean temperatures and chemical properties impact these ecosystems even further by modulating their biological productivity, and these properties change with climate. In the California Current, for example, ocean conditions vary greatly with events such as El Niño - Southern Oscillation and marine heat waves, like “The Blob”, which strongly impact the marine ecosystem and coastal environment in general. Given the importance of these coastal regions (about 80 M people live around them and 20% of the fisheries catch worldwide come from these areas), it is imperative to have reliable short- or long-term predictions on how these regions will be impacted by climate variability. In this talk we will explore the California Upwelling Ecosystem and all its moving parts, the California Upwelling System current state, and discuss the challenges in monitoring, understanding, and predicting present and future changes.

Speaker: Marisol Garcia-Reyes, Farallon Institute