ID 118 : The Greenland Ice Sheet: Stability, History and Evolution

Subsection:
North Eemian Ice Core Project.

Leader:
Prof. Dorthe Dahl-Jensen (Univ. Copenhagen)

Title of Belgian Contribution:
The last interglacial and beyond: a northwest Greenland deep ice core drilling programme during the International Polar Year (IPY-NEEM)

Short description of the core IPY project:
The last interglacial was warmer than the Holocene, providing an analogy for an anthropogenically-warmed world. A deep ice core reaching back into the penultimate glacial period (the Saalean) is proposed to provide a much-needed North Atlantic Climate Record for bipolar studies. In addition, the Holocene period from this deep ice core will provide a better isotopic record of the present climate than those from other Greenland ice cores.

ULB task list:
The ULB will participate in the analysis of the basal sequence of this new ice core as well as in the dating of the core and the influence of ice dynamics herein.

Field work:
The ULB team will participate in one drilling season (at the end of the drilling project) on the Greenland ice sheet.

Belgian partners:
- F. Pattyn (PI),
- R. Lorrain (co-PI) and
- JL. Tison (co-PI)

Funding:
- FNRS: Fonds de recherche fondamentale collective (FRFC)

Budget:
84,200 Euro

Period and timing of the project:
Starting date: 01/01/2007
Ending date: 21/12/2010