We would like to let you know that a draft document ‘The Rationale, Design and Implementation Plan for Biogeochemical-Argo’ is now available for community consultation. Biogeochemical-Argo is the extension of the Argo array of profiling floats to include floats that are equipped with biogeochemical sensors for pH, oxygen, nitrate, chlorophyll, suspended particles, and downwelling irradiance. The draft plan stems from the discussions held at a workshop on 11-13 January 2016, at the Laboratoire d’Oceanographie de Villefranche, France. 

Comments on the draft plan can be addressed to Ken Johnson (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) and Herve Claustre (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) through August 15.  

The document has been reviewed by attendees of the Villefranche workshop and supported by the Argo Steering Team.

A summary of the report has also been presented at a variety of scientific meetings including:

• Global Climate Observing System Science Meeting, Amsterdam, 2-4 March 2016
• Argo Steering Team, Yokohama, 22-24 March 2016

as well as in the near future the:

• US OCB Summer Meeting, Woods Hole, 25-28 July 2016

A session at the US OCB Summer Meeting will also report on work being done in the Southern Ocean Carbon and Climate Observations and Modeling program (SOCCOM), which is one of several regional float arrays being operated around the globe.  In many regards, these regional arrays serve as prototypes for a global array of profiling floats with biogeochemical sensors. 

The final Biogeochemical-Argo document and responses to comments will be posted at the web site: http://biogeochemical-argo.org/, which has not yet gone active.

This document should be cited as:

Biogeochemical-Argo Task Team. 2016. The Rationale, Design and Implementation Plan for Biogeochemical-Argo.