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During their scientific expedition to the coast, Katherine Leonard and Alain Hubert shared some interesting anecdotes on their encounters with the locals.The International Polar Foundation would like to thank T.A.G.E.O. for giving us the rights to use their music as the soundtrack for this video. myspace.com/tageo

This movie details the Princess Elisabeth Station project from the plans to the end of the building phase. It is a short version of a movie created to present the station at the 2009 Baltimore ATCM. The International Polar Foundation would like to thank T.A.G.E.O. for the video soundtrack.

Irina Gorodetskaya is a Post-doctoral Research Scientist at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Belgium). In previous years, she was responsible for installing the instruments to be used at the Princess Elisabeth Station in the framework of the HYDRANT project, a project aimed at measuring various parts of the hydrologic cycle of Antarctica.

From its labs over its offices to its scientific shelters on the ridge, the Princess Elisabeth Station offers scientists a wide array of well-equipped facilities to conduct their research. This support also head into the field with them with the entirely outfitted lodging containers and mobile laboratories.

This is the message T.R.H. Prince Philippe and his daughter Princess Elisabeth of Belgium addressed to Alain Hubert, the International Polar Foundation (IPF) and to everyone having participated in the Princess Elisabeth Station project. This message was filmed and pre-recorded in the IPF offices of Brussels and was broadcasted during the official inauguration of the station in Antarctica on February 15th, 2009.

There's no improvising the building of a "zero emission" station. Aside from having to determine the various ways of producing energy, you also have to find a way to store the energy and a way to coordinate the sources supplying the base. Ecological research is therefore, in addition to being a model for the future, a lesson in energy management and logistics.

Although the Princess Elisabeth Station is now finished and the last members of the expedition have just returned from Utsteinen, the story isn't over yet. The actual life of the station has just begun, showing an example of how to face the challenges of the future. Next season, the station will accomodate new scientific research teams.

Everyone at Utsteinen has just woken up, yet the village is already full of activity. First on the agenda is the station, where we find the ingredients to fix lunch and dinner. Meanwhile, Koen and Benoît are mounting the solar panels on the station.

Jean- Louis Tison is a Glaciologist, and the Co-director of the Glaciological Laboratory of the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences (Université Libre de Bruxelles). This season will be his fifteenth time in Antarctica. Joining the BELARE 2010-2011 expedition, he will be heading the BELISSIMA (BELgian Ice Sheet-Shelf Ice Measurements in Antarctica) to study the interaction between the ocean and the ice sheet.