NEPTUNE
Canada CFI Proposal SUMMARY (February, 2002)
NEPTUNE is an innovative facility that will transform
marine science. A network of more than 30 subsea observatories
covering a complete 200,000 sq. km. tectonic plate in
the Northeast Pacific, it will draw power from shore
and exchange data with scientists ashore through more
than 3000 km of submarine fibre-optic cables. Each observatory
will host and power many scientific instruments on the
surrounding seafloor, in boreholes in the seafloor, and
buoyed up into the water column. Remotely operated and
autonomous vehicles will reside at depth, recharge at
observatories, and respond to distant labs. Continuous
near-real-time multidisciplinary measurement series will
extend over 30 years. Free from the limitations of battery
life, ship schedules, shipboard accommodations, bad weather
and delayed access to data, scientists anywhere in the
world will monitor their deep-sea experiments in real
time on the Internet, and routinely command their instruments
to respond to storms, plankton blooms, earthquakes, eruptions,
slope slides and other events.
This revolutionary approach, with its significant scale
and reliable technology, will lead to fundamental advances
that are impossible using periodic ship voyages. Scientists
will be able to pose an entirely new set of questions
and experiments to understand complex, interacting Earth
System processes.
Canadian scientists from coast to coast are eager to
use NEPTUNE to move ahead in four major research areas:
the structure and seismic behaviour of the ocean crust;
the dynamics of hot and cold fluids and gas hydrates
in the upper ocean crust and overlying sediments; ocean
climate change and its effect on the ocean biota at all
depths; and the barely known ecosystem dynamics and biodiversity
of the deep-sea. All involve interacting processes, long
term changes, and non-linear, chaotic, episodic events
that are hard to study with traditional means.
NEPTUNE is a US/Canada (70/30) partnership to design,
test, build and operate the network on behalf of a wide
community of scientists. The proposed site is the Juan
de Fuca Plate, partly in Canadian waters off Vancouver
Island. Shore stations will be located in Victoria BC
and Nedonna Beach OR. The total cost of the project is
estimated at up to $300,000,000, from concept to operation.
About $30,000,000 has already been spent or funded on
design and development.
Resource extraction is moving into the deep sea. Climate
change is affecting fisheries. Populations are expanding
in earthquake-prone coastal regions. NEPTUNE will be
the first of many such cabled ocean observatories, and
will attract world-wide attention. There is much to be
gained by being among the scientific and industrial pioneers.
Canadian industry can develop new products and expertise
and gain exposure in new markets, world-wide. New scientific
understanding will help with real Canadian problems ranging
from seismic hazard assessment to fish stock management
in a changing climate. The multidisciplinary data archive
will be an amazing, lasting resource for scientists and
students. The Canadian public will share in the research
discoveries of one of the last unexplored places on earth.
An early funding commitment will ensure maximum benefits
for Canada.
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