The Top 100 science stories of the year are now listed at Discover Magazine. The story of Arctic ice retreat, resource claims, and seafloor mapping for the extension of Outer Continental
Shelf areas is placing 5th out of that 100. A nice map of Arctic resource claims is provided. The story of Arctic claims ranks highly here at DSN, too. Craig has been reporting dutifully on Russian shenanigans with the MIR submersibles, for example.
The emerging story of Arctic claims is the subject of the United States Extended Continental Shelf (ECS) project, executed under Interagency Committee on Ocean Science and Resource Management Integration (ICOSRMI) and
Joint Subcommittee on Ocean Science (JSOST) leadership. Through this program, NOAA applies funds from the Ocean Exploration budget across multiple federal agencies to accomplish
the resource mapping entrerprise. The article above contains a link to a NOAA webpage
reporting on one of the Ocean Exploration cruises executed by the ECS Task Force,
involving the Joint Center at UNH, NOAA, USGS, and USCG.
Hat tip to JP for the story and the link. – PJE
I just sat down to work on a talk about the Arctic for a Retirement Home Continuing Education program…and started to procrastinate so clicked on over here…only to discover the Arctic! Thanks for the info and more importantly, keeping me on track! Your powers over procrastination are amazing!
There’s lotsa petroleum in that area, possibly more than the entire Middle East. If any country on Earth has the technology to get to it, it would be the U.S. That’s the real impetus behind the ECS project. Read more in “The Energy Non-Crisis” by Lindsey Williams, now out of print, but available in HTML form on the Web.
The idea of vast untapped offshore resources definitely seems to prevail among the marine geologists I’ve worked with. It certainly makes sense that the US would have a program to research the extended continental shelf. Other countries are forging ahead.