Honorary Co-Chair Mayor Billy Kenoi County of Hawaii

 Honorary Co-Chair Dr. Brian Taylor    Dean of SOEST, University of Hawaii  

     We welcome OCEANS '11 attendees – with your dynamic theme of "Oceans of opportunity and partnerships across the Pacific" – to Kona, where new ocean opportunities represent a real area for growth and development.

     Hawaii Island, the second most populous and largest county in the state, in many ways is a microcosm of our planet. It has 13 of the 15 climate zones found on earth, missing only high arctic and mangrove swamps.  Hawaii Island is a leader in natural energy production and is furthest along of the four counties in meeting the state's ambitious goal of 70 percent alternate energy power generation by the year 2030. At our Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawaii in Kona, we have nurtured Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion, a promising source of inexhaustible power. Hawaii Island is pioneering biofuels both from algae and fast growing land-based crops. We are looking at wave energy options and the possibility for energy storage in sea floor compressed air units. We are a leader in fisheries, aquaculture and marine conservation.

     However, not only does Hawaii Island thrive in deep sea applications but it is home to one of the world’s most dynamic astronomy communities focused on the telescopes at the summit of Mauna Kea, the premier stargazing platform on the planet Science and technology are both part of Hawaii Island’s legacy as well as, a window into the future for an island which still embraces an ancient and vibrant culture focused on the ocean.

     We welcome you and invite you to explore this special and unique place. Relax, do business, invest and come back. Help us grow our ocean science and technology base. Be part of the dream that is Hawaii Island.

     The OCEANS conference of the Marine Technology and Oceanic Engineering Societies comes to Hawaii once per decade. As Dean of the School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, it is my privilege to serve as honorary co-chair of the OCEANS '11 meeting and to welcome the hundreds of delegates attending from over 25 countries.  I note with pleasure that a significant number of the papers presented here are from our school and its collaborators, and that our staff play a prominent role on the local organizing committee.  As operators of two ocean-class research vessels, two deep diving submersibles, AUVs and a range of ocean sensing equipment, we are heavily involved in most of the technology and innovations being discussed at this conference. The record submittal of 750 abstracts reflects positively on the Hawaii venue and the excellent marine research conducted here.

     I thank OCEANS '11 for accommodating the papers planned for the International Symposium on Underwater Technology (UT) and the Workshop on the Scientific Use of Submarine Cables and Related Technologies. These Tokyo meetings had to be cancelled after the devastating 3/11 earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown. I offer a special welcome to our Japanese colleagues who have gone to the extra effort to present most of the papers from the UT symposium at OCEANS '11.

     This year's conference highlights the areas of ocean observing, acoustics, tsunami preparedness, AUV’s, offshore energy, marine minerals and monitoring. Cutting edge work is occurring in these fields as we try to understand the Pacific marine environment, monitor its changes and prepare to optimally use its resources while acting in an environmentally respectful manner.  I invite you to share with me a splendid technical program in a setting beyond compare, to meet new colleagues, to reacquaint with old ones and to enjoy the hospitality of what Mark Twain described as “the loveliest fleet of islands anchored in any ocean”.