IQuOD 2nd Annual Workshop Report. June 4-6, 2014 NOAA, Silver Spring, USA.

Abstract

The 2nd IQuOD (International Quality-Controlled Ocean Database) meeting was held at NOAA, Silver Spring, US from 4-6 June, 2014. The project’s structure and goals were refined and clarified and it was clear that a published meeting report, a scientific report on the project and the scientific implementation plan are essential for seeking funding and in-kind support. One of the key items for the meeting was to review the automatic QC benchmarking test efforts from the previous year. Some progress was made on these tests, during the next year, the benchmarking tests will be refined, finalised and reported on. The manual QC group was given several tasks for the coming year to begin comparison and clarification of manual QC methods, including a realistic estimation of the cost of manual QC and the goal of a manual QC workshop prior to the next IQuOD general meeting. A new task group to investigate file formats, uncertainty estimation methods and flagging methods was formed and will move forward with investigating existing schemes that will suit IQuOD. Funding from all countries is limited for the present, but in-kind support, allocation of hours within existing projects and working with existing projects are workable methods for now. Support from IOC subgroups is being sought and funding schemes being further investigated.