1. Underway Water Quality Mapping: Throughout the program

Aim

EPA will continuously map the water quality of Port Phillip Bay, Western Port and Bass Strait using the Pelican as a ÒShip of OpportunityÓ with the installation of automated instrumentation. Outcomes include: benchmarking water quality for any changes in climate and catchment discharge associated with the prolonged drought; build on knowledge of spatial water quality gradients in Port Phillip Bay, Western Port and Bass Strait.

Methods

As the vessel cruise at 6knots, the underway system will analyse pumped sample water via an existing water intake at 1m depth on the SV Pelican hull.

The underway-sampling system is composed of two sub-systems:

á            High frequency system: consist of a Seabird SBE45 Thermosalinograph, a Seabird SBE38 remote thermometer sensor and a WetLabs FLNTU(RT) fluorometer/turbidity meter, measuring every second.

á         

B
 

A
 
 Nutrients Flow Injection Analyser system: measuring Filtrable Reactive Phosphorus, Ammonia and Nitrate at a 20 seconds rate.

The two data sets will be merged together using GPS (Global Positioning System) data recorded every second and fed to a computer.

Logistics

á            Underway set up (EPA)

á            FIA (EPA, Monash Uni)

á            Pump for underway (EPA)

á            Sample bottles for nutrient and chlorophyll a (EPA)

á            Standard for calibration of FIAs (Monash Uni)

á            Standard for calibration of turbidity meter (EPA)

Personnel

Text Box: Salinity and FRP maps from the Two Bays 2007 study Guillaume Martinez, Rick Royle, Nigel Nichols, Meredith Jay