南极洲正在建设一座“冰记忆”冰库，用于在约−50°C的天然低温环境中保存来自全球冰川的冰芯。该冰库位于冰面下9米，靠近康科迪亚站，设计寿命约80年。冰芯封存于一个35米长、5米宽的雪结构腔体中，通过被动冷却维持稳定温度。首批样本已于2025年12月抵达，经过约两个月、全程维持−25°C的运输，跨越约1,200公里完成最终转运。

冰芯是重建地球气候史的关键资料，记录了温度、温室气体、污染物和火山活动等信息。科学评估显示，若全球变暖轨迹达到2.7°C，到2100年全球冰川体积将缩减至当前的约20%；在升温超过4°C的最坏情景下，存留比例将低于10%。即便过去相对稳定的区域也开始出现退缩，突显在冰川消失前进行系统性保存的紧迫性。

自2016年以来，研究团队已在阿尔卑斯山、玻利维亚、俄罗斯、挪威和塔吉克斯坦提取冰芯；在南极周边，钻探深度可达2,800米，揭示可追溯至约100万年前的大气信息。项目的国际治理与样本分配仍在制定中，计划未来10年内形成机制。尽管极地科研资金与地缘政治不确定性上升，冰库的长期目标是为未来数百年的科学研究提供稳定基准，在数十年后冰川消失时仍能保留其环境记录。

An Antarctic “Ice Memory” vault is being built to preserve ice cores from glaciers worldwide in a naturally frozen environment maintained at about −50°C. Located 9 meters beneath the ice near Concordia Station, the vault has an expected lifespan of roughly 80 years. Ice cores are stored in a 35-meter-long, 5-meter-wide snow chamber that relies on passive cooling. The first samples arrived in December 2025 after a roughly two-month journey that maintained −25°C across about 1,200 kilometers.

Ice cores provide critical archives of Earth’s climate, recording temperatures, greenhouse gases, pollutants, and volcanic activity. Scientific estimates indicate that under a 2.7°C global warming trajectory, total glacier volume would fall to about 20% of current levels by 2100; in a worst-case scenario exceeding 4°C, less than 10% would remain. Even regions once considered stable are now shrinking, underscoring the urgency of preserving samples before glaciers disappear.

Since 2016, researchers have extracted cores from the Alps, Bolivia, Russia, Norway, and Tajikistan; near Antarctica, drilling reaches depths up to 2,800 meters, revealing atmospheric data dating back roughly 1 million years. Governance and access rules for the vault are still being developed, with plans targeting the next 10 years. Despite rising funding constraints and geopolitical uncertainty, the vault aims to provide a stable scientific baseline for centuries, ensuring that environmental records survive even as many glaciers vanish within decades.