The Future Earth PEGASuS 2—Ocean Sustainability project built on the Future Earth Program for Early-Phase Grants Advancing Sustainability Science (PEGASuS), which aimed to develop effective research communities around three major themes:
- Integration of water, energy and food management
- Prediction of and adaption to rapid changes in ecosystems
- Sustainable management of ocean resources
Phase 2 of PEGASuS continued the collaborative focus on integrated team research and deepened the emphasis on strong, integrative, team-based scholarly outputs through a focus on deep synthesis. To maximize the impact of this synthesis, the PEGASuS team collaborated with the US National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS).
The PEGASuS 2 project addressed four main themes:
- Pathways toward the sustainable and equitable use of oceans. Here, the focus was on the environmental, social and economic impacts of living and nonliving resource extraction (from fisheries to mining), and non-extractive industries (i.e., shipping, tourism, coastal development).
- Accounting for and minimizing the impacts of global change. Our capacity to sustainably extract resources and derive services from the oceans depends on our understanding of the multi-scale changes in ocean systems, and the additive, antagonistic and synergistic effects of the multiple causes of these changes.
- Exploring and minimizing the impact of pollution on ocean health. Research and synthesis in this area aimed to provide a better understanding of the impact of key pollutants on ocean goods and services and a mechanistic understanding of the delivery systems (social, natural and physical) of these pollutants.
- Predicting, mitigating, and responding to ocean disasters to reduce risk. Climate change, rising sea levels, changing storm patterns and the increasing complexity of human use of ocean and sub-ocean resources collectively create a range of risk factors that vary and interact across space and time.
PEGASuS 2 was led by Joshua Tewksbury at the University of Colorado Boulder and Colorado State University.
