News Release 04-040

April 5, 2004

This material is available primarily for archival purposes. Telephone numbers or other contact information may be out of date; please see current contact information at media contacts.

ARLINGTON, Va.—The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded a contract to Integrated Ocean Drilling Program Management International, Inc. (IODP-MI) for central management and planning for the IODP. IODP-MI will also coordinate and support program data archiving, sample archiving, publishing activities, education and outreach. The contract has an estimated cost of $429 million over 10 years. The Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (MEXT) will consult with NSF in contract management.

James Allan, program director in NSF's division of ocean sciences, stated, "this contract represents the final major step in the implementation of the IODP, the largest international earth science program in history. It is the culmination of many years of planning efforts by international scientists to have strong, centralized management and control over science operations in this new drilling program." The IODP will use a variety of drilling platforms to help solve major problems, including the history of global climate change, the origin of damaging earthquakes, and the origin of life and extent of subsurface microbial activity.

IODP-MI is a non-profit, U.S. corporation, recently formed by 15 U.S. and seven Japanese leading institutions in the geosciences. It is expected that an additional eight institutions from Europe will join this corporation shortly. IODP-MI will plan and coordinate the efforts of the IODP science operators and drilling platforms. The core drilling platforms consist of an all-purpose, U.S. light drillship, and the 57,500-ton heavy drillship Chikyu, under construction by Japan and oriented towards deep crustal drilling in harsh environments. These drillships will be augmented by "mission-specific" platforms, used for drilling in shallow or Arctic waters and sponsored by a consortium of European countries.

IODP is an international program of basic research that succeeds the Deep Sea Drilling Project (1968-1983) and the Ocean Drilling Program (1983-2003). IODP differs from these programs in having multiple drilling platforms and equal partners in program contributions (the United States and Japan). IODP also differs from other large international science programs in that contributions are not "in-kind" but are instead managed centrally under contract. More information is available at http://www.iodp.org/

-NSF-

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Media Contacts
Cheryl Dybas, NSF, (703) 292-7734, email: cdybas@nsf.gov

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