The 6th ECORD Council meeting was held at the Swedish Research Council (VR) and was presided by the Council Chair, Jonas Börck, Sweden.
Membership
The ECORD Council welcomed the efforts made by Belgium, Canada and Ireland in securing funding for joining ECORD and IODP. Belgium is now a provisional member of the Consortium, whereas Canada and Ireland were included as full members. In all, the Consortium now comprises 17 member countries.
The ECORD Executive as of April1, 2005 consists of J.Börck (Chair), S.Dürr (Vice Chair), C.Franklin (Vice-chair), C.Mével (EMA), S.Persoglia (Italy) and a representative of Norway (TBD). M.Kullin (Switzerland) has been nominated Vice Chair as of October 1, 2005.
Other nominations endorsed by the ECORD Council are:
- G. Wefer (Univ. Bremen) and H.R. Thierstein (ETH) as alternates for ECORD delegates to IODP-MI Board of Governors,
- J.Pearce (Cardiff U.) as alternate ESSAC Chair for Chris MacLeod and G.Camoin (CEREGE) as Vice-Chair of ESSAC as of 1st October 2005,
- R.Pedersen (U.of Bergen) as SPC member and R.Stein (Alfred Wegener Institute-AWI) as Chair of SSEPs from October 1st 2005.
Science and operations advice
Upon hearing the report of O.Eldolm (IODP-MI BoG Executive committee member) on activities of IODP-MI Board of Governors, the Council discussed the role of IODP-MI in science strategy and policy development, and, in addition the relative roles of IODP-MI and the SPPOC committee in this realm. ECORD council expressed some concern about the “flexibity” of the IODP structure and passed the following motion that will be communicated to SPPOC and the IODP-Council:
ECORD Council motion 05-01-06. Science advice in IODP.
ECORD Council received a report from the European members of IODP-MI and are satisfied that Europe is now well represented on IODP-MI. The Council discussed the role of IODP-MI in science strategy and policy development. In addition, the relative roles of IODP-MI and the SPPOC committee in this realm remain unclear. ECORD council, and after discussion with the ESSAC chair, ESSAC, are concerned that :
1) The flexibility of the IODP programme does not permit a rapid response to new and innovative, and often, “high-risk” science
2) Proposals which require different types of drilling (MSP, non-riser, Riser), including Complex drilling proposals, are all treated in the same way by the IODP SAS structure. This may inhibit short legs, some MSP proposals and other drilling requiring tested infrastructure reaching the final ranking and scheduling stages rapidly.
Recommendations:
• Accelerate the SAS evaluation process
• Introduction of a fast track for timely and strategically appropriate proposals.
• Increase the pool of MSP proposals.
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Management Forum
All ECORD members are all welcome to send their comments and ideas on the functionality and efficiency of the current SAS structure to the ESSAC office to be discussed at the IODP Management Forum to be held in Rome on May 24-26, 2005. Position papers are accepted until May, 2.
ESSAC reported on the outcome of the ESSAC meeting # 4 held in Graz on April 7-8, 2005 and presented a draft of the set of general IODP guidelines for science party quotas, which ESSAC developed following the need of National Offices to exercise some flexibility with respect to staffing. The guidelines reflect the role of ESSAC in staffing the IODP expeditions and will be discussed at the IODP Management Forum. ESSAC is actively working to prepare the ESF proposal for the Magellan workshop series and the Eurocores – EuroMARC, for which a draft call is to be prepared before the pre-management committee on Eurocores (23 May 23). In view of the recent earthquake-related events, the ECORD Council recommended that ESSAC organize a workshop on Geo-hazards as soon as possible.
EMA reported on the status of contracts among EMA, BGS, and NSF, and on the fulfilled and planned outreach activities. Among the latter is the coming ICDP-IODP Townhall meeting at the EGU Conference in Vienna (April 26, 2005), and the press event organized with the participation of the Geological Survey of Ireland in Dublin during the port call of the Porcupine Carbonate Mounds Expedition 307, on April 27-28, 2005.
C. Mével attended the REView COMmittee for ACEX (Expedition 302), organised by IODP-MI on last October. The evaluation of the expedition was conducted in a positive way. Problems during the preparation and implementation of the cruise were identified. Recommendations to help improve the next expeditions came out of the meeting. The meeting report can be downloaded from here.
ESO reported on the ACEX mission-specific platform (MSP) expedition and on the plans for Tahiti and New Jersey Margin expeditions. The ACEX offshore part of the expedition was completed within reasonable budget limits, and the first MSP Onshore Science Party was held in Bremen. 32 scientists from USA, Japan, UK, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, Sweden, the Netherlands and Norway analysed and sampled 339 meters of core on 8-20 November 2004. Expedition Results Post-Cruise Editorial Meeting will be held at College Station in early May, or June.
The tender for Tahiti Sea-Level Expedition 310 was completed. The ECORD Council decided to recommend ESO to proceed with planning and implementation of the Tahiti Expedition in 2005 using a cheaper vessel. If this is not feasible, the final decision will be made by the Executive, including a possible use of 2006 funds, after receiving more information on other options.
Future funding opportunities within the EC
Marco Weydert from the ERA-Net group of the EC was present at the meeting and the Council discussed various future funding options (Article 169, ERA-net plus, Infrastructures) through the EC, in addition to hearing details of the ERA-Net scheme. A subset of the Council Executive and the ECORD-Net coordinator, J.Ludden, will visit the EC in Brussels to discuss the opportunities for additional funding.
Next Council meeting: ECORD Council feels it needs an exchange on science and strategy with ESSAC and consequentially, the next Council meeting will be organised jointly with ESSAC.
Venue: Edinburgh, Scotland, U.K., November 24-25, 2005.
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Participants
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| ECORD Council members |
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Reinhard Belocky
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Austria
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| Anders Kjaer |
Denmark |
| Lars Stemmerik (alternate) |
| Anu Huovinen |
Finland |
| John Ludden |
France |
| Sören B. Dürr (vice-Chair) |
Germany |
| Sergio Persoglia |
Italy |
| Raymond Schorno |
Netherlands |
| José Hipolito Monteiro |
Portugal |
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Olga Dias (alternate)
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| Benjamin Sanches (alternate) |
Spain |
| Jonas Björck (Chair) |
Sweden |
| Else-Marie Friis |
| Marcel Kullin |
Switzerland |
| Chris J. Franklin (vice-Chair) |
U. K. |
| Observers |
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Catherine Mével
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EMA
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| Svetlana Zolotikova |
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Dan Evans
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ESO
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| Jeroen Kenter |
ESSAC |
| Marco Weydert |
E.C. |
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Amelie Winkler
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ECORD-Net
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| Olav Eldholm |
IODP-MI BoG |
| Dave Falvey |
| Eibhlin Doyle |
Ireland |
| Helen Bell |
UK IODP |
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Martina Hilger-Hildebrandt
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ESF
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