Desarrollo de la Antártica

EL DESARROLLO DE LA ANTÁRTICA regions, outside activities would be severely restricted during the long winter mondhs by darkness and severe cold, while the low tempera– tures would reduce úhe effeetive life of all mechanical equipmem, partieularly that used for transporto Finally, ihJgh bonuses would to be paid lo encourage people to offer for work under the prevailing conditions and mere would be the usual erop oI probIems assocÍated with people living in an isolated, remote region. A really rich g.old or platinum mine might be worth exploiting, but the eeonomie eonsiderations underlying mining oI any other mineral would at the present time malee it an extremely doubtful proposition. The question of off-shore oil /has received prominenee recently in the world press. However, no accumulations oI petroleum or other minerals that could be classified as "mineral deposits" ihave been Iound in the seas surrounding Antarctiea. Minor, unmeasured, shows of methane with. a litde ethane gas were encountered in holes drilled during 197:3 in the Continental Shelf in the Ross Sea region by the "Glomar Challenger" during tJhe U.S. Deep Sea Drilling Projeet. These holes were deliberately sited to avoid geological struetures whieh might have acted as reser– voirs for oil iQf gas, so should not be considered as having I been in any sense prospecting investigations. A small of methane gas wa~ encountered during drilling into sediments beneath the Ross Ice SheIf near McMurdo. Mari:ne geophysi:eal reeonnaissances ha,ve indicated considerable thicknesses. of sediment off the Antarctic eoast but neither source rocks for hydrocarbons nor economic drilling targets have been identified. At the ¡present state of our knowledge it would seem that: a. there is s.ome possibility tibat serious prospecting might dis.cover oil in tibe k'\ntaretic; b. fuere is a higher probability that such a diseovering will oceur off-shore than on the continent itself¡ C. the most suitable areas for prospecting ·are on the continental shelf surrounding the Antaretic Peninsula and in the Ross Sea area. Sihould off-shore oH be discovered the difficulties of exploiting it would be extremely great. Moving pack-ice would prevent tJhe use of fixed oH drilling or pumping platforms. Presumably it would be possible teclmieally to use pumps situated on tlhe sea bed, pumping into sea.bed tanks. Tankers eoming; in during the brief period in