The world’s first ice core storage facility, the Ice Memory Sanctuary, has officially opened on the Antarctic plateau. Two ice samples extracted from the Alpine glaciers of Mont Blanc and Grand Combin were delivered there. These cores are considered valuable climate archives because they contain information about atmospheric composition, precipitation and past pollution.
The sample journey took more than 50 days. They were transported by a scientific vessel from Europe, and then transported by a special flight to the Franco-Italian Concordia station. The temperature was maintained at minus 20 degrees along the entire route in order to preserve ice structure and the gases it contains.
The storage facility is an ice cave carved out of thick snow and ice. It is located at a depth of about nine meters, does not use refrigeration equipment and maintains a stable temperature of about minus 52 degrees thanks to natural conditions. This allows samples to be preserved without the risk of melting or contamination.
The Ice Memory project has been implemented by an international consortium of scientists since 2015. Its goal is to collect and preserve ice cores from glaciers that are rapidly disappearing due to climate change. Since 2000, the world has already lost about 5% of the volume of mountain glaciers, and in some regions – up to 39%.
According to the researchers, the preserved cores will become a “time capsule” for science. Even if many glaciers disappear, future generations will be able to study ancient ice using new technologies and obtain the data needed to understand climate processes and make decisions.
The creation of an ice storage facility in Antarctica was an important step in preserving the planet’s climate legacy. Scientists hope that the archive will help better understand the Earth’s past and more accurately assess climate risks in the future.
Source: Phys.org
Photo: R. Ascione ENEA PRNA IPEV
