Schweppe Lecture Series

Dr. Hans W. Paerl

Tuesday, March 7, 2006, 7:00 PM, Visitors Center Auditorium

Effects of a rise in Atlantic Hurricane Activity on Estuarine Water Quality: The North Carolina Experience

Hurricane frequencies and intensities vary cyclically.  Since the mid-1990’s, the Atlantic and Gulf Coast regions have experienced a dramatic increase in the number of hurricane landfalls.  In eastern North Carolina alone, seven category 2 or higher hurricanes have made landfall in the past 9 years.  Individual storms differ in characteristics such as wind strength, rainfall, and duration and therefore have different impacts on coastal water properties and ecosystems. The storms themselves, and also their variability, present a formidable challenge to coastal management programs aimed at reducing nutrient loading and eutrophication (enhanced algal growth) in Pamlico Sound and its estuarine tributaries, the second largest estuarine system in the US after Chesapeake Bay. Dr. Paerl will discuss the varied impacts of several of these storms on the linked physical, chemical, and biological systems in the region. Ultimately these climatic forcings cannot be managed but must be considered when developing water quality management strategies for these and other areas faced with increasing frequencies and intensities of hurricane activity.

 Hans Paerl is the Kenan Professor of Marine and Environmental Sciences at the UNC-Chapel Hill Institute of Marine Sciences, Morehead City, NC, where he has been on the faculty for over 25 years. Dr. Paerl received his doctorate in Ecology and Limnology from the University of California at Davis in 1973. He has designed and directed numerous water quality and environmental research programs in North Carolina, while also pursuing research interests in the Atlantic Ocean, Caribbean Sea, South and North Pacific Oceans, Baltic Sea, and large lake ecosystems. Some of his recent studies have addressed the importance and ecological impacts of atmospheric nitrogen deposition in estuarine and coastal environments and the development and application of bio-indicators used to assess human- and climate-induced change in aquatic ecosystems.  His work plays a central role in coastal water quality and fisheries issues facing North Carolina and the nation. In February 2003 he was presented with the G. Evelyn Hutchinson research achievement award by the American Society of Limnology and for “contributing to the understanding of aquatic microbial processes, for documenting linkages among the atmospheric deposition of nitrogen, coastal eutrophication, and harmful algal blooms, and for crossing traditional research boundaries to system-level perspectives within freshwater, estuarine and marine ecosystems.”

The free lecture will be held at 7:00 p.m. in the Visitors Center of The University of Texas Marine Science Institute in Port Aransas, and the public is invited to attend. Dr. Paerl's visit to the Marine Science Institute is part of the Laura Randall Schweppe Endowed Lecture Series in Marine Science.