Surfside Science

Surfside Science is an initiative to co-develop and validate low cost and replicable methods for coastal environmental monitoring on SIDS, making use of remote sensing and low-cost electronics.

The goal is to identify which methods can contribute to improving access to data collection systems on small islands, with all methods and findings documented and shared openly. The approach focuses initially on Surfside Bay in Aruba as a case study, and includes development and testing of field monitoring stations, protocols, and remote sensing tools that can be expanded across the island and replicated on other islands. The initial set of parameters to be tested includes to following areas of environmental monitoring:

• Air Quality: Particulate matter, humidity and temperature
• Water Quality: pH, dissolved oxygen, temperature, and electrical conductivity
• Coastal Change: Vegetative cover, coastline, size of reef islands
• Seafloor Mapping: Seafloor cover, including shallow reef and aquatic vegetation

Instructions for every step of the process are written up and shared for others to replicate, including protocols for processing of underwater imagery, construction of monitoring stations, adaptation of scripts for satellite imagery analysis, building of localized databases, connecting to our data portal, and further validation.

Start Date: 02/08/2022
End Date: 02/11/2026

Lead Contact: Christie Mettes (christie@metabolic.nl)