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Polar Pod: an extraordinary maritime and scientific expedition

Environment

Polar Pod: an extraordinary maritime and scientific expedition

2021

In July 2021, the Teréga Accélérateur d’Énergies endowment fund joined Jean-Louis Etienne to support the Polar Pod expedition. This project aims to improve our scientific knowledge by collecting data from the Southern Ocean, the planet’s main oceanic carbon sink.

Polar Pod

Objectifs

The Polar Pod project will study the Southern Ocean, its fauna and the Antarctic circumpolar current. This expedition will help gather scientific data that will be of major interest.

Objectif n°1

Study

the Southern Ocean

Objectif n°2

Collect

open source scientific data shared with the scientific community

Objectif n°3

Create

an educational programme on global warming and marine biodiversity

Teréga, committed to the energy transition

For several years, Teréga has been committed to the energy transition to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which are responsible for global warming. As such, Teréga launched the internal environmental programme, BE Positif, in 2017. This ambitious programme has already enabled us to contribute to France’s carbon neutrality by the end of 2020. To take our environmental commitment even further, we have included an action line on “Mobilisation for the protection of the environment and biodiversity” in our Teréga Accélérateur d’Énergies endowment fund.

It is through this strategy, that Teréga decided to support the Polar Pod expedition of Jean-Louis Etienne. A project that is committed to the environment and the preservation of biodiversity by exploring the Southern Ocean.

Polar Pod: an extraordinary maritime and scientific expedition

The goal of the Polar Pod expedition is to study the Southern Ocean, one of the most difficult to access and remote oceans on Earth, in order to collect scientific data. As the world’s main oceanic carbon sink, it is of major interest to the international scientific community. Indeed, the scientific data that will be collected will be a precious key to better understanding the climate control, of which the Southern Ocean is an essential part, but also to study the Antarctic circumpolar current.

To carry out this expedition, a new kind of vessel was created, the Polar Pod. The particularity of this ship is to be a vertical oceanographic platform, 100 metres high for a weight of 1,000 tons, which allows it to remain stable, even in case of strong swell or storm. Without engines, the specific feature of this platform is to drift around Antarctica, like a satellite, in order to collect data.

Key figures

2 years

of expedition around Antarctica

24,000 km

of Antarctic circumpolar current crossed by the Polar Pod

2 months

on board the ship for the crews before relief

8 people

on board the ship

0 carbon

emissions for the Polar Pod

Teréga, Accélérateur d'Énergies endowment fund

Teréga, Accélérateur d'Énergies endowment fund

contact-fdd@terega.fr

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