The Global Environment 



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The Nation's interest in the seas, the land 

 beneatli, and tiie atmospliere. above recjuire 

 that it attain tlie capability to observe, de- 

 scribe, understand, and predict oceanic proc- 

 esses on a global basis. The Nation is engaged 

 or must be prepared to engage in operations 

 in all of tlie world's oceans at increasing 

 depths and in increasingly hostile environ- 

 ments. It has a vital stake in the living and 

 nonliving resources of the global seas. Its 

 industry, commerce, and agriculture are cri- 

 tically dependent on the weather controlled 

 in large measure by global ocean conditions. 

 The safety and well-being of its people and 

 their property must be protected against the 

 hazards of air and ocean. 



The environmental information the Na- 

 tion requires for these purposes ranges from 

 descriptions of the topography, geophysics, 

 and geological structure of the deep sea floor 

 to the understanding of the normal condi- 

 tions of the oceans' chemistry, biology, 

 thermal structure, and motions, and the pre- 

 diction of the rapidly changing ocean and 

 atmospheric phenomena recognized as our 

 daily weather and sea state. 



Major etforts already are underway to ac- 

 complish these formidable tasks. Men have 

 journeyed briefly to the deepest parts of the 

 ocean. Scientists routinely obtain photo- 

 graphs of the world's cloud cover from satel- 

 lites. The United States participates with 

 other nations in such international or- 

 ganizations as the World Meteorological 

 Organization and the Intergovernmental 

 Oceanographic Conmiission for the study of 

 the oceans and the atmosphere. Some of these 

 international activities have been organized 

 for almost a century to provide real-time 

 data describing weather and sea conditions in 

 many i)arts of the world. Otliers of more 

 recent origin have been organized to explore 

 and.undci-stand the processes of the global 



Waterspouts off the Bahamas 

 prolific a stark cramplc of the 

 i/lobal interaction hclwccn 

 atmosphere and sea. 



seas. Efforts to date, although extensive, are 

 but a token of what needs to be done. 



Tlie Commission concurs in the views ex- 

 pressed by the President's Science Advisory 

 Committee Panel on Oceanography that the 

 need to consider the environment as a whole 

 is a scientific imperative, for the oceans and 

 atmosphere and solid earth are interacting 

 parts of a single geophysical continuum. 



Eventually, man must undei-stand the sea, 

 the air, and the land as a single, incredibly 

 complex system. The currents of the oceans 

 and the roughness of the sea's surface are 

 principally the result of the winds in the 

 lower atmosphere and of the shape of the 

 ocean floor and its coastlines. Large ocean 

 swells breaking on the Pacific coast of the 

 United States may be generated by winds 

 Ijlowing over the southern Atlantic Ocean. 

 The tsunami — a series of long-period, energ^'- 

 packed waves which can wreak ha^'oc along a 

 coast — is generated by shifts of the earth's 

 solid crust. A hurricane receives much of its 

 destructive energy by absorbing heat directly 

 from the ocean and by condensing the water 

 vapor supplied by the sea. On a longer time 

 scale, the oceans play a lai'ge role in the 

 global circulation of the atmosphere, and 

 shifts in large-scale weather conditions and 

 climate are related to clianges in the ocean 

 conditions. 



The size of the oceans makes it difficult to 

 acquire the observations needed to under- 

 stand the global environment. Expanding 

 present programs will help, but existing sys- 

 tems, even if expanded, cannot provide all the 

 types of data needed. Fortunately, radically 

 new technology are available to help us ac- 

 quire, communicate, and analyze data. Satel- 

 lites, data buoys, deep submersibles, modern 

 ocean research and survey vessels, and an 

 array of sensing equipment and te<'hniques 

 to accompany them promise that eventually 



