Justify Your Trip

The Esri Oceans Summit is an initial, onetime event. For the first time in the company's 40-year history, Esri is undertaking a comprehensive ocean GIS initiative. Hence, the summit will be a primary means of advancing this initiative.

The Esri Oceans Summit is a high-level, strategic workshop (it is not a general all-comers conference). We have carefully chosen a select group of ocean GIS analysts and developers to help us move forward in our thinking about our approaches and products. We are literally setting the road map for the future of ocean GIS within the Esri organization and perhaps the future of ocean GIS as a discipline.

Reasons It Is Important to Attend

This summit represents the first international meeting of the Esri ocean science community that focuses on standardizing ocean-specific GIS solutions and workflows. Within breakout groups, attendees will discuss inconsistencies in ocean data models, formats, standards, tools, services, and terminology. Next, they will collaborate to define and prioritize technology gaps in ocean science GIS. In response, Esri will be better able to extend the reach of GIS tools and data models, improve communication between Esri and the ocean science community, and grow the community of ocean science GIS practitioners.

Attendees will have the opportunity to interact with peers and speak in depth with Esri personnel. Because of its strategic importance, intimacy, and intensity, this opportunity cannot be repeated.

The bulk of the meeting and the most important work to be done will be accomplished in breakout groups that will occur in smaller rooms. Here, face-to-face interaction is absolutely critical.

Role of Attendee

Every person is required to submit a position paper. These papers will form an important user-based ocean science and management document that Esri staff members can reference as they plan enhancements to software and products.

Every person is expected to verbally share knowledge, perspectives, lessons learned, and GIS vision for the future.

Every person will collaborate with the other participants, add to discussion on highly technical issues, and strive to meet the following objectives:

• Define and prioritize technology gaps in coastal and ocean GIS
• Identify barriers to the use of GIS in ocean science and management, along with associated functional requirements
• Recommend ways to remove barriers and advance technical solutions in multidimensional and sensor data formats, tools, accuracy and uncertainty, workflows, and computing platforms

Breakout Group Topics

The Plenary Session will set the stage for work in the breakout groups. Dawn Wright, chief scientist, Esri, and Ben Halpern, UCSB CMAP will give an overview of where ocean GIS technology is today. This will be followed by a panel of scientists and technologists who will discuss current barriers to GIS applications in ocean sciences and management.

Day One Topics

• Marine geology and geophysics—Bathymetry/Geomorphology for science and surveying; sediment, paleoclimate, and other research; and subsurface geophysics and seismic analysis
• Chemical oceanography—Acidification
• Physical oceanography—Ocean circulation, ocean/atmosphere interaction
• Marine ecology—From plankton to marine mammals
• Fisheries science—Stock assessment and catch-share
• Coastal and marine spatial planning (CMSP) and ecosystem-based management (visioning group for CMSP science)
• Ocean observing systems (IOOS, US regional associations, OOI, GEOSS)

Day Two Topics

• Multidimensional data formats—HDF, netCDF, OpenDAP, and others
• Sensor formats—Multibeam sonars, gliders, and others
• Volumetric data structures such as voxels
• Analytic tools and associated workflows
• Computing platforms
• Web services
• Uncertainty/Accuracy