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Project number 33089 Innovation Fund Proposal Project information Project title The Churchill Marine Observatory Applicant institution University of Manitoba Collaborating institutions University of Calgary, University of Victoria Project leader Name David Barber Title/position Professor, Canada Research Chair (Tier 1), Associate Dean (Research) Project funding Total project cost $31,775,435 Amount requested from the CFI $12,396,452 Percentage of the total project cost requested from the CFI (maximum 40%) 39% Disciplines Primary discipline GEOPHYSICS Primary sub-discipline Applied Geophysics Secondary discipline ENVIRONMENT Secondary sub-discipline Bioremediation Tertiary discipline ELECTRICAL AND ELECTRONIC ENGINEERING Tertiary sub-discipline Digital Signal Processing Areas of application Primary Development of the North Secondary Fossil fuels and their derivatives Submitted on 2014-06-27 Project number 33089 Innovation Fund Proposal Keywords Research or technology development Bioremediation, chemical dispersants, petroleum ecotoxicolgy, sea ice dynamics and thermodynamics, ecology and ecosystem structure Specific infrastructure Arctic, Oil in Ice Mesocosm, Comprehensive Environmental Monitoring, Hudson Bay Submitted on 2014-06-27 2 Canada Foundation for Innovation Project number 33089 Plain language summary This summary will not be used in the review process. Should the project be funded, the CFI may use it in its communication products. The Churchill Marine Observatory (CMO) will be a globally unique, highly innovative, multidisciplinary research facility located in Churchill, Manitoba, adjacent to Canada’s only Arctic deep-water port. The CMO will directly address technological, scientific, and economic issues pertaining to Arctic marine transportation and oil and gas exploration and development throughout the Arctic. CMO will include an Oil in Sea Ice Mesocosm (OSIM), an Environmental Observing (EO) system, and a logistics base. OSIM will consist of two saltwater sub-pools designed to simultaneously accommodate contaminated and control experiments on various scenarios of oil spills in sea ice. The EO system will be located in the Churchill estuary and along the main shipping channel across Hudson Bay and Strait. The EO system will provide a state-of-the-art monitoring system and will be used to scale process studies conducted in OSIM to Hudson Bay and the larger Arctic environment. The logistics base will underpin all CMO research. CMO will position Canada as a global leader of research into the detection, impacts, and mitigation of oil spills in sea ice. Knowledge gained through CMO will strengthen Canada’s technological capacity to protect the Arctic environment. Partnerships with indigenous organizations will ensure knowledge exchange; the private sector will provide market-driven uptake of technology; and various levels of government will transfer knowledge into policy and regulation. Project summary Proposal 3 University of Manitoba Project Summary 33089 The Churchill Marine Observatory (CMO) represents a first-of-a-kind facility for the circumpolar Arctic. Located in Churchill, Manitoba, and adjacent to Canada’s only Arctic deepwater port, CMO will dramatically advance knowledge of oil spills in areas with sea ice, impacts of these contaminants on the marine ecosystem, and development of environmental technologies designed for detection and mitigation of oil in ice-covered waters. The CMO will allow the international research team to continually strive for global leadership by conducting world-class, transformative research and technology development in Arctic System Science. This strategic priority is shared by University of Manitoba (UM), the University of Calgary, and the University of Victoria, the three collaborating institutions in this proposal. In addition, CMO fully complements existing research facilities in Churchill and contributes to the formation of a national observing system for the Arctic in partnership with the Canadian High Arctic Research Station (CHARS), Churchill Northern Studies Centre (CNSC), private sector partners, and multiple government levels. Proposed Research Infrastructure CMO is specifically designed to investigate a variety of contaminants under both landfast first-year sea ice and mobile ice types. Three mutually supporting core research and technology elements are proposed: 1) the Oil in Sea Ice Mesocosm (OSIM); 2) a fully integrated Environmental Observing (EO) system; and 3) a Logistics Base. Research capacity enabled by CMO will include the following: A newly developed suite of remote sensing and modeling tools for detecting contaminants at multiple space and time scales. Procedures to mitigate environmental impacts from a spill using conventional techniques such as dispersants and in situ burning, in addition to novel techniques such as cold temperature-adapted bioremediation. Advanced capacity to monitor for and quantify potential impacts from shipping and development activities in the Arctic while also providing advanced information required by operators for safe shipping, exploration and development. The true strength of the proposed program is the full integration of OSIM research and technology development with the state-of-the-art EO system. The EO system directly supports OSIM by supplying in situ data on the natural range and variability of the key environmental factors that define ocean/sea ice/atmosphere (OSA) climate states. By deploying identical instruments in both OSIM and the EO system, equivalent observations will be made in the upper ocean, ocean-ice interface, through the ice volume, and the ice-atmosphere interface. This level of coordinated cross-disciplinary environmental monitoring is unprecedented in Canada’s Arctic. 4 University of Manitoba Project Summary 33089 OSIM will address research of how crude oils, distillates, fuel oils, herding agents, dispersants and residues from in situ burning, liquefied natural gas, and other transportation-related contaminants affect processes across the OSA interface. The OSIM science objectives are organized under three broad categories: i) detection, ii) impacts, and iii) mitigation to develop an understanding of what effects various contaminants have on Arctic ecosystems, and on the thermodynamic and dynamic evolution of snow-covered sea ice. To bridge the gap between field experiments and those conducted under simulated conditions, OSIM will offer a unique opportunity to grow Arctic sea ice under ambient winter conditions. It will consist of a reinforced above-ground pool, 30’ (width) x 60’ (length) x 10’ (depth) with a permanent dividing wall to create two sub-pools. Natural seawater will be pumped from the estuary into the sub-pools. One sub-pool will be dedicated to oil spill and other contaminant mesocosm experiments with the second sub-pool as an uncontaminated control. This facility will also feature a retractable roof and above- and below-water sensor systems. By drawing water directly from the estuary, OSIM will also provide capacity for discrete daily to weekly monitoring of standard physical-chemical attributes of water quality, spectral fluorescence, size distribution, and environmental DNA to assess microbial abundance and diversity and to screen for invasive species. This will contribute to scale studies. The EO will provide a synchronized suite of instruments to study processes of OSA coupling, biophysical monitoring, and, in particular, the effects of freshwater and extreme weather on oil spills and other contaminants from marine transportation. This facility (approx. locations below) will incorporate underwater moorings and atmospheric observation platforms, capable of near real-time internet data transfer, located along the shipping corridor to/from the Port of Churchill. One estuary, one smart-profiling, and three shipping lane moorings are proposed. The estuary observatory (E in map) and the smart profiling observatory (2 in map) will be dedicated technology-development moorings. Efforts will focus on the development and testing of tools such as fish biomass sensors and logic-driven profiling “SeaCycler” technology that senses and adapts sampling strategies to respond automatically to prevailing conditions. In collaboration with ONC, the estuary mooring will be linked with a direct optical cable connection to CMO. The system will be designed and equipped for real-time observations of biogeochemical and optical water properties including monitoring of algal biomass for major taxonomic groups, zooplankton biomass and species composition, fish biomass and species composition, and acoustic tracking of marine mammals. By sampling water directly from the inlet structure of OSIM, variation in chemical and biological properties will be integrated with experiments conducted in OSIM to evaluate how shipping and oil may impact higher trophic levels. All moorings will monitor ice thickness using ice profiling sonar. 5 University of Manitoba Project Summary 33089 In support of comprehensive ocean system observation, the shipping lane moorings (1 in map) located in Hudson Bay and Strait will monitor ice thickness and motion, as well as salinity, temperature, ocean fluorescence, dissolved oxygen, chlorophyll, and other relevant ocean-state variables. Locations of the moorings will be selected to optimize the relevance of observations to marine transportation and maximize the ability to detect and monitor conditions should contamination occur along the transportation corridor. These moorings will also permit the deployment of developmental technologies such as a contaminant-detection system. An atmospheric observatory (E in map) will provide real-time data on extreme weather events and atmospheric chemistry at the OSIM site. In addition to monitoring atmospheric variables, the observatory will house a scanning X-band dual-pole Doppler weather radar and suite of realtime sensors for air quality. Parameters from these instruments are central to understanding extreme weather impacts on coupled OSA processes, dispersion, and burn studies of oil in ice. The logistics base is a necessary supporting component of the CMO, underpinning all aspects of the research at the facility. This base will provide access to the Churchill River estuary and will include field preparation labs, a data acquisition room to acquire and transmit data streams from CMO sensors, a dedicated coastal research vessel, and a staging/storage building. Additional lab facilities located at the Churchill Northern Studies Centre will be used to provide for processing and stabilization of samples prior to their transfer to more advanced laboratories. Anticipated Outcomes The CMO is proposed as a national facility, serving national and international needs and gathering over 170 researchers from six Canadian universities, three international universities (Aarhus, Denmark; Greenland Climate Research Centre, Greenland; and University of Washington, Seattle, Washington), 10 government departments, and 10 private sector partners. This facility will present an exceptional opportunity to train a new generation of experts on Arctic sustainable development. CMO will lead direct integration of industry, government and academic interests, and ensure an ability to forge and foster productive, value-added partnerships within and among institutions, sectors and disciplines. Industry and government members of a CMO Board of Directors will be able to capitalize on scientific knowledge from academic members, allowing them to commercialize technologies and techniques first developed in CMO. Pre-competitive research will focus around detection, impacts and mitigation of oil in ice technologies. The EO system will be used to validate and scale studies from the OSIM facility in order to ensure Arctic-wide relevance of CMO outputs. The three mutually supporting core research and technology infrastructure elements will contribute to substantial research innovation, sustainable marine transportation, and the exploration and development of Arctic resources. Through the Board, and a commitment to sharing of results, data, technology, and methods, CMO will help ensure that governments and industry have comprehensive information available to conduct environmental assessments and to plan for and respond to economic development pressures throughout the Arctic. 6