Accountability,Education,

Monitoring,Evaluation,
Communication and Partnerships
funded by the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative
The principles of the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative stress accountability, action and urgency. Through this
focus area of work, NOAA is contributing the use of best available science to assist in making progress toward
to the objectives of the initiative. The projects in this focus area are vitally important to providing resources and
the scientific data necessary to sustain this investment in Great Lakes restoration. NOAA is moving forward
with a coordinated network of scientific observations, information for decision makers about the impacts climate
change, and the implementation of adaptive management through the Lakewide Management Plan process.

Implementing a Great Enhancing Climate Change

Lakes Observing System
The Great Lakes Observing System (GLOS) is one of
11 Regional Associations across the U.S. responsible
for partnering with the NOAA Integrated Ocean
Observing System in the coordination of regional
observing systems. GLOS is using GLRI funds to
support instruments for collecting data, standardizing
and integrating the data collected with additional data
from regional partners, and developing models and
visualization programs that will help decision makers
across the Great Lakes interpret and understand the
data. By collecting and bringing data together in a
way that ensures the information can be used with
other data sets, GLOS will make a broader suite of
data available to scientists, resource managers and
decision makers with the goal of creating a system to
enable better informed decisions about how to best
manage the Great Lakes.
Coordinating
Implementation of Lakewide
Management Plans
The GLRI is providing support for an enhanced process
of developing and implementing Lakewide Management
Plans for each of the five lakes. NOAA is integrating
current research and wide array of products and
services in collaboration with other federal agencies, the
states, basin communities and tribal interests to restore
and protect the lakes.
Information and Creating
Resilient Communities
The goal of addressing climate adaptation and
mitigation is important to NOAA and it is working to
create an informed society that is anticipating and
responding to climate change and its impacts. NOAA’s
efforts in the Great Lakes focus on the collection of
baseline climate data, increasing the understanding
of climate change impacts, and the customization of
adaptation strategies within the Great Lakes community
to enable informed adaptation decisions throughout the
basin.
This includes:
• the creation of an inventory of existing elevation
data above and below water at the coast line and
filling in critical gaps of information along the coast
of Lake Superior
• the extension of existing regional climate models,
creating a larger set of possible climatic outcomes,
and broadening current models to include three
dimensional visualization and ice cover; and
• providing information and management tools to
coastal communities to help them develop plans to
adapt to the impacts of climate change.

For more information contact: Jennifer Day, NOAA

Great Lakes Regional Coordinator
(734) 741-2266
jennifer.day@noaa.gov