"This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5)."
The Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) project has the potential to revolutionize ocean science by providing the means to collect unique, sustained, time-series data sets that will enable researchers to study complex, interlinked physical, chemical, biological and geological processes operating throughout the global ocean. The OOI infrastructure will include deep sea-buoys capable of deployment in harsh environments such as the Southern Ocean and regional electro-optical cabled nodes on the seafloor spanning several coastal observatories. These assets will all be integrated by a cutting edge, open access, user-enabling cyberinfrastructure that will link the marine components and facilitate experimentation.
This Cooperative Agreement will cover the construction (ARRA & MREFC funds) and initial operations (R&RA funds) of the OOI project. The OOI construction project was developed under a separate NSF award and followed the NSF Large Facilities Manual. The project underwent extensive scientific, technical and project management reviews.
