Wind River/Bighorn Basin District
| Contacts: | Sarah Beckwith, 307/347-5207 | |||
| Beth Potier, University of New Hampshire, 603/862-1566 |
Researchers Dig into Bighorn Basin for Climate Change Clues
Researchers from the University of New Hampshire are searching for climate change clues on public lands in Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin this summer. As part of the partnership between the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the Bighorn Basin Coring Project (BBCP), pairs of cores are being drilled at three sites through Aug. 11 to better understand the long-term carbon cycle of the earth.
A team of 27 scientists from 11 institutions will drill a series of 2½" diameter cores about 150 meters into the sediment of the basin’s stratified layers of rocks that they hope will yield clues about a massive release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere that occurred about 55 million years ago during a period of extreme warming called the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM).
Crews from the BBCP were recently working on BLM-managed lands 3 miles northwest of Basin but are now working at Polecat Bench west of Powell and will move to BLM-managed lands on Gilmore Hill in the McCullough Peaks area on Aug. 1.
This pioneering National Science Foundation-funded geological study will be the first time scientists have drilled continental cores in an attempt to understand this release of carbon dioxide and the warming, an environmental anomaly called a hyperthermal event, that surrounded it.
The PETM was one of the most significant episodes of warming in the last 100 million years. Sediments deposited during the PETM are well-exposed in the Bighorn Basin, offering an opportunity to understand this event and apply what is learned to current earth system changes.
For more information, please contact Archaeologist Mike Bies, BLM contact for the project, at 307-347-5100, or visit the BBCP website at http://earth.unh.edu/clyde/BBCP.shtml.
The BLM manages more than 245 million acres of public land, the most of any Federal agency. This land, known as the National System of Public Lands, is primarily located in 12 Western states, including Alaska. The BLM also administers 700 million acres of sub-surface mineral estate throughout the nation. In Fiscal Year (FY) 2011, recreational and other activities on BLM-managed land contributed more than $130 billion to the U.S. economy and supported more than 600,000 American jobs. The Bureau is also one of a handful of agencies that collects more revenue than it spends. In FY 2012, nearly $5.7 billion will be generated on lands managed by the BLM, which operates on a $1.1 billion budget. The BLM's multiple-use mission is to sustain the health and productivity of the public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations. The Bureau accomplishes this by managing such activities as outdoor recreation, livestock grazing, mineral development, and energy production, and by conserving natural, historical, cultural, and other resources on public lands.
Wind River/Bighorn Basin District 101 South 23rd Worland, WY 82401