SCICOM establishes a Program Planning Group for assessing the role of the Arctic in global change, particularly with respect to Earth's climate, through scientific drilling.

Overall Goal

To develop a mature science plan concerning those aspects of Arctic drilling that bear on global problems, particularly with respect to the climate system on times scales from decades to millions of years.  This PPG will build on the existing Implementation Plan of the Nansen Arctic Drilling (NAD) program and will consist partly of NAD scientists.
 

Mandate

1. Identify those aspects of the Arctic climate system that can potentially have a global impact and that can be investigated through scientific drilling.

2. Identify those aspects of the Arctic's tectonic development and magmatic history that may have impacted global climate in significant ways or that may also have global relevance in their own right.

3. Summarize the technical needs, opportunities, and limitations of drilling in the Arctic.

4. Design a drilling strategy to accomplish the scientific objectives.
 

Timeline

The PPG will exist for 1 year and will be evaluated by SCICOM at the end of that year.