CHINESE CONTINENTAL SCIENTIFIC DRILLING PROJECT

A Brief Introduction to the Chinese Continental Scientific Drilling Project

Continental scientific drilling, a telescope penetrating into the Earth’s interior for direct observation of the Earth’s crust, is a high-tech systematic engineering with epoch-making significance in geosciences. One of the important measures is to solve some serious problems encountered by mankind such as resources, disasters and environment, which make up new challenges to the Earth following man’s landing on the Moon.

Employing modern deep drilling techniques, Chinese Continental Scientific Drilling (CCSD) Project is to drill a 5000 meter deep hole in the eastern part of Dabie-Sulu ultra-high pressure metamorphic (UHPM) belt that has global geoscientific significance. The scientific objective is to reconstruct the forming and exhumation mechanisms of the UHPM belt by interpretation of the analyzed data from the drill core, liquid and gas samples taken from the hole, the in-situ logging data and information. The further aims are to reveal the deep materials constitution of the convergent plate margin, its mineralization and fluid action, and to establish a deep laboratory for long-term observation and a base for research on deep crust materials.

This project was listed in July 1997 as one of the National Key Science Engineering Projects in the period of the ninth Five-Year-Plan by the State Science and Technology Leading Group, and on May 7, 1998 as one of the International Continental Scientific Drilling Projects by the International Continental Drilling Program (ICDP). The project, which started in 2000, will last five years.

The Dabie-Sulu UHPM belt is the largest belt in the world. The CCSD project, aiming at this important research topic in modern geosciences, will explore the deep geodynamics processes with the purpose of improving the theory of the continental dynamics. Moreover, a complete system of new techniques for deep and hard rock drilling will be developed through the implementation of this project, thus the drilling technique in China will be raised to a new level.