Technical Advisory Committee on Simulating Living Resources in the Long Island Sound Integrated Model - Final Report
- Published:
- December 23, 2022
- Associated with:
- Modeling Workgroup
In 2020, New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) initiated a project to develop an updated comprehensive hydrodynamic and water quality model for Long Island (LIS). The DEP Long Island Sound Hydrodynamic and Water Quality Modeling Support project (LIS-HWQMS) includes the development of updated hydrodynamic and water quality models (HWQMS) of LI Sound. The LIS-HWQMS provides the physical and biogeochemical components of the overall Integrated Model Framework (IMF) to ensure that physical, biogeochemical, and living resource sub-models provide science-based representations of how these sub-models drive circulation and mixing, biogeochemical interactions that control dissolved oxygen (especially the onset and persistence of hypoxia), nutrient cycling, eutrophication, water clarity, ecological processes and living resources in estuarine and coastal waters.
The IMF will support assessment of management strategies for a range of spatial scales including (a) system-wide (LI Sound, New York Bight, New York Harbor), (b) regional (LI Sound), and (c) local embayments and tidal river/estuaries (e.g., Port Jefferson Harbor, NY; Niantic River/estuary, CT) under current and future climate change conditions. The IMF will be developed in a modular fashion over a period of several years to account for the linkage between watershed loading, hydrodynamics, water quality and living resources. It is anticipated that the IMF will provide a state-of-the-art modeling framework to support science-based assessments and decision-making for investments in management strategies for the next decade (or longer) by DEP, EPA, and State agencies (NYSDEC, CTDEEP, NJDEP).