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National Ocean Service Program and Staff Offices

NOAA's National Ocean Service is composed of seven program and two staff offices. Summary program information for each of these offices is provided through the links below.

Program Offices

  • Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services

    Looking for information on tides? The Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services, also known as “CO-OPS,” is where you want to head. CO-OPS and its predecessors have gathered tide information along our nation's coasts for over 200 years.

  • National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science

    Science provides the foundation for making wise decisions about the use of our ocean and coastal resources. At the National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science, scientists are conducting and supporting the research, monitoring, and assessment needed to help manage coastal ecosystems and society’s use of them.

  • National Geodetic Survey

    While we may tend to think of the Earth as a round, smooth globe, in reality its shape and surface are quite complex. This complexity provides challenges when trying to determine the latitude, longitude, or elevation of a point on the Earth's surface. Figuring all of this out is part of the science of geodesy. At the National Ocean Service, geodesy is the business of the National Geodetic Survey.

  • Office for Coastal Management

    A top priority of the Office for Coastal Management (OCM) is to unify private sector, nonprofit, scientific community, and government efforts to make coastal communities more resilient. In addition to delivering a wide variety of coastal data and tools, the office offers training and other opportunities for coastal communities to define common goals and work smarter. OCM initiatives run the gamut from protecting endangered species to erosion to generating better building codes for storm-resistant buildings.

  • Office of Coast Survey

    The Office of Coast Survey (OCS) is the nation's nautical chart maker. OCS collects, manages, and compiles the data and information necessary to maintain the national suite of more than 1,000 nautical charts.

  • Office of National Marine Sanctuaries

    Did you know that around the U.S., there is a network of marine sanctuaries designed to preserve and protect some of our nation’s most valuable underwater places? Managed by the Office of National Marine Sanctuaries, the national marine sanctuary system includes 13 sanctuaries and one national monument.

  • Office of Response and Restoration

    When oil and chemicals are released into the environment, they are not only unsightly—they are also harmful to us and to other living things. Within NOAA, the Office of Response and Restoration is tasked with providing the science and information needed to support the U.S. Coast Guard during spills and in coordinating with federal, state, and tribal natural resource trustees to restore coastal resources damaged by those spills.

Staff Offices

  • U.S. Integrated Ocean Observing System Program

    When it comes to monitoring our nation’s ocean, coasts, and Great Lakes, the U.S. Integrated Ocean Observing System (U.S. IOOS®) plays a key role. Composed of partners from federal, regional, private sector, and academic organizations, IOOS is a network of tools to track, predict, manage, adapt, and respond to changes in our marine environment in order to protect lives, property, and the environment.

  • Management and Budget Office (MBO)

    The day-to-day administrative operations of the National Ocean Service headquarters happen within the Management and Budget Office (MBO). In this role, MBO also provides support to the National Ocean Service Assistant Administrator and the organization’s program and staff offices.
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