Introduction

Abstract

The Regional Ocean Modeling System (ROMS) is a widely used community model forregional applications. Over the last several years, the ROMS group at the Jet Propulsion Lab/Caltech (JPL), in collaboration with the ROMS group at Univ. of California, Los Angeles, has been developing coastal ocean forecasting systems for various regions of the U.S. west coast. These systems are tide-permitting, data-assimilative, and real-time. The forecasting systems developed by JPL ROMS group were operationally used in support of field experiments for Monterey Bay, California in 2003 and for Prince William Sound, Alaska in 2009. One such system is currently in operational use and provide 24/7 forecasting of sea surface height, temperature, salinity, and current fields for the Southern California Bight region (http://ourocean.jpl.nasa.gov/SCB). All these systems have nested domains with the highest resolution of 1km. These systems can collect datafrom different observing platforms and forcing fields from atmospheric models, assimilate observational data and provide visualization and validation of model forecast. Some applications, such as drifter trajectory prediction based on surface current, werealso developed for these systems. Based on coastal forecasts from four models with different resolutions and heritages, JPL ROMS group developed a multi-model forecastto guide the path of autonomous gliders in a field experiment in 2009, which was the first such endeavor along U.S. coast. The highlights of the group’s work, in collaboration with Scripps Institution of Oceanography, also include a new type of underwater vehiclewhich is totally powered by the temperature difference in ocean surface and depth(http://solo-trec.jpl.nasa.gov). In the presentation, I will discuss the details of thesecoastal ocean forecasting systems and current work and future plans of JPL ROMS group.