The unique collection is available to users worldwide. Over the past two decades, the CRC staff has provided library service to over 35,000 people. In addition, the CRC facilities are available to high-school and college students for a variety of academic needs. Most industry core studies attempt to correlate in-place borehole surveys, such as for porosity, with rock taken from known depth intervals. However, increasing interest is also being given to the environmental functions drillholes can perform when used, for example, as disposal sinks for unwanted fluids such as salt water produced with oil.
USGS workers transport core-testing capabilities to the drill site.
A number of science holes are drilled and cored every year by the USGS and other science agencies, and the CRC makes its field core-testing equipment and expertise available to these important projects. Because many physical and chemical properties of cores can change quickly after being removed from the ground, the CRC often tests and processes core samples on-site soon after they reach the surface. The National Ice Core Laboratory , a cooperative with NSF and the University of Colorado, retains, curates, and makes available over 30,000 feet of ice cores taken from ice sheets around the world. Work conducted on these ice cores supports global climate-change research by providing detailed annual records of climate and weather variations for the past 250,000 years. Recent results of ice core studies indicate that large natural swings in temperature and precipitation, sufficient to initiate global changes in ice distribution, occur in a matter of a few tens of years.