With the aim of contributing to sustainable ocean development amid the global climate change crisis, the Korea Institute of Ocean Science and Technology (KIOST, President Park Woong-seo) announced that a project titled “Subseasonal to Seasonal North Pacific Prediction” that it had submitted to the ForeSea^* program of the UN Ocean Decade, led by UNESCO/IOC, was selected last September.

* ForeSea: The Ocean Prediction Capacity of the Future

The United Nations recently declared the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development^* and is encouraging the realization of related goals. As a participant of the program, KIOST will work to expand the global ocean prediction capability by building a regional, high-resolution, air-sea coupled climate prediction system for the North Pacific, establishing a seasonal ocean prediction system using an Earth system model (KIOST-ESM^*), and providing data about air-sea interactions over the Bering Sea and tropical western Pacific.

* A 10-year global marine exploration and research project participated in by all members (150 countries) of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) to realize a sustainable ocean (2021-2030)

* A numerical prediction model developed by KIOST that targets the entire globe to predict various climate indicators, including sea surface water temperature, salinity, and sea level temperature, of a future climate change scenario that simulates the carbon cycle.

To identify the characteristics and causes of the gradually rising sea surface temperatures around the Korean Peninsula amid global warming, a research team led by senior researcher Park Young-gyu, of the KIOST Ocean Circulation Research Center, conducted a four-year project titled “Establishment of a system for the identification and prediction of causes of high sea surface temperature around the Korean Peninsula attributable to the subarctic West Pacific.” The project was supported by the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries.

The research team performed ocean environment observation in the Bering Sea and international waters of the Philippines using the ISABU research vessel and conducted time-series measurements of the characteristics of ocean-air interaction at sea level using unmanned observation systems such as wave gliders and buoys. In addition, based on data on high sea temperatures around the Korean Peninsula collected during the summer of 2021, the research team analyzed the causes of high sea surface temperature.

Furthermore, the Ministry of Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries and the US NOAA^* announced at the annual conference on Korea/US ocean science and technology cooperation that KIOST and the GFDL,^* under the NOAA, which is leading international efforts on climate and ocean circulation modeling, would jointly implement, from 2023, a project titled, “Modeling and assessment of oceanic processes and their influence on climate variability, change, extremes, and impacts in the Northwestern Pacific.”

* NOAA: National Oceanic And Atmospheric Administration

* GFDL: Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory

KIOST President Kim Woong-seo said, “By joining the mission of the UN Ocean Decade, KIOST is expected to make a significant contribution to sustainable ocean development, and we at KIOST are dedicated to strengthening our ocean prediction capability, consolidating international cooperation with related countries, and safeguarding the security of the people.”