A group of scientists are drilling through the oldest ice in Antarctica to study the climate 1.5 million years ago.

Named "Beyond EPICA-Oldest Ice", and funded by the European Commission and coordinated by the Institute of Polar Sciences of the National Research Council of Italy (CNR-ISP), the project started in 2019 and will run for 7 years.

According to British Antarctic Survey (BAS), the project partner, the first phase of the drilling campaign began last November in the Little Dome C area, at an altitude of 3 233 meters above sea level.

"This phase will last until January 2022, and the team hopes to be able to drill about 170 meters per week," explains British Antarctic Survey.

In these drillings, several samples of ice, temporarily stored in an ice cave, will be collected and later analyzed. And at the end of the research, the researchers hope to obtain information about the climate and greenhouse gases present in the atmosphere at the time, in order to relate these conditions to the evolution of temperature.

"During our previous EPICA (European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica) project, which ended in 2008, we were able to extract and analyze an 800,000-year-old ice core. Now we are trying to go back in time: because if we want to have a correct perspective on what the world is currently experiencing with climate change, and adopt appropriate mitigation strategies, we must look even further back - which is what we are trying to do in Antarctica with Beyond EPICA-Oldest Ice," Carlo Barbante, director of the Institute of Polar Sciences, explains to BAS.