MAPping ecology
A REVOLUTIONARY environmental monitoring project is to be created for the Great Barrier Reef.
A three-year, $1 million research project was announced yesterday by Rio Tinto Alcan, CSIRO and the Great Barrier Reef Foundation.
It will be the first to monitor ocean chemistry along the length of the reef.
The project, called Future Reef MAP, involves the deployment of an ocean sensor system on an existing Rio Tinto vessel that travels between Weipa and Gladstone.
CSIRO ocean carbon research team leader Dr Bronte Tilbrook said to protect the reef, it was necessary to understand how water chemistry, including acidity levels, varied both regionally and across different habitats of the reef.
