Draft Environmental Impact Statement Environmental Impact Report For The California Acoustic Thermometry Of Ocean Climate Project And Its Associated Marine Mammal Research Program PDF Download

This EIS/EIR presents a detailed description of the proposed project, in addition to other information required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The overall Acoustic Thermometry of Ocean Climate (ATOC) project is an international research effort to observe the ocean on the large space scales (3,000 to 10,000 km) which characterize climate, which will enable climate models to be tested against the average ocean temperature changes seen by ATOC over a few years and if, and when, the models prove adequate, use those same observations to initialize the models to make meaningful predictions. The basic principle behind ATOC is simple. Sounds travels faster in warm water than in cold water. The travel time is a direct measure of the large-scale average temperature between the source and receiver. Measuring average ocean temperatures is necessary to validate global climate computer models being used and developed to answer the question of whether our earth is warming as a result of the "greenhouse"effect.