iStock
Scientists from the UK’s National Physical Laboratory (NPL) and New Zealand’s Measurement Standards Laboratory are set to carry out earthquake sensing tests in the Pacific Ocean using existing undersea optical fibre cables.
It is incredible to think that more than 70% of the Earth’s surface is covered by water, and much of this water in our seas and oceans remains largely unmonitored.
Installing and maintaining permanent seabed sensors to monitor our oceans is challenging and expensive.
However, the NPL, a UK government laboratory managed by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), has created a technique that uses existing fibre optic cables to gather continuous, real-time environmental data from the seabed.
By performing ultra-sensitive optical measurements, this technique does not require any new hardware or infrastructure – instead it ‘converts’ the fibre optic cable itself into an environmental sensor.
In a new partnership with Measurement Standards Laboratory in New Zealand, the two companies will later this year test this technique on a section of the 3,876km-long Southern Cross NEXT cable on the floor of the Tasman Sea in the Pacific Ocean between New Zealand and Australia.
As the Pacific Ocean is a highly seismically active area, it is ideal to test whether the use of an existing seafloor cable such as this can be used as a tsunami early warning system, for instance.
According to NPL, future projects could develop this concept into a worldwide monitoring network, giving earlier and more accurate detection of earthquakes and tsunamis. It could also advance the world’s understanding of ocean floor geology and climate change through the long-term monitoring of seafloor temperature changes.
Dr Peter Thompson, CEO of NPL, said: “This technology, pioneered at NPL, is the perfect example of how our science can create impact, delivering tangible benefits for society, which will simultaneously improve our understanding of the world.”
Annette Koo, director and chief metrologist at MSL, added: “MSL is delighted to partner with NPL to bring this potentially powerful technology to the Pacific. It is another beautiful example of improvement in measurement giving us access to depths of information that in turn push the limits of our metrology.
“Not only that, but we see precision measurement underpinning our aspirations for a sustainable future. Our earliest timekeeping devices – calendars – allowed us to live according to the rhythms of our natural world. And now the next generation of clocks is unlocking a new richness of insight into our planet.”
