INTRODUCTION
Harmful algal blooms (HABs) have negative impacts on human and marine wildlife health and on coastal economies, and are increasing in frequency worldwide. This trend, and its potential to inflict rising economic and societal costs, has encouraged the development of harmful algal bloom forecasting tools in recent years.

The Environmental and Anthropogenic Impacts on HABs in Coastal Ecosystems project seeks to further the development and implementation of ecological forecast models.

Our primary objectives are to implement existing HAB models from Santa Barbara and Monterey Bay previously developed as research exercises; to test and expand these existing models in other regions; to begin developing a similar modeling effort for paralytic shellfish poisoning; and to provide consistent field monitoring and validation data to adequately assess the model results.

A metric of our success will be the development and transfer to our partners (HABMAP, CeNCOOS, SCCOOS, NOAA National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science) of a web-based tool for forecasting probability of HAB events, tracking known blooms, and accessing the underlying data (environmental conditions, HAB monitoring data, satellite and model results) that are readily accessible by researchers, resource managers, and interested members of the public.

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How can predictive models help?