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A Brief History Of the Founding Of IARC and the Syun-Ichi Akasofu Buiilding
See also The Akasofu Years.
The building that now houses the International Arctic Research Center (IARC) was originally conceived as an extension to the Elvey Building, the home of the Geophysical Institute (GI), which was expanding rapidly in the 1990s and desperately needed space for its new projects and faculty, students, and staff. However, financing the extension of the Elvey building was virtually impossible, since neither the University nor the State had funds for this. Thus, Syun Akasofu, who was then the director of the GI, sought funds from both the United States and Japan. In his discussions in Japan, it became clear that they were interested in participating in the development of an international research center, if a similar interest were to be expressed by the United States. Dr. Akasofu thus consulted with Senator Stevens, who wrote to Ambassador Kuriyama in February 1994, suggesting that the United States and Japan jointly establish an Arctic research center at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.
Subsequently, then Vice President Gore also wrote to Ambassador Kuriyama who responded enthusiastically in March 1995, and asked for a concrete proposal. After preliminary discussions between the U.S. State Department and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, and with the approval of the University of Alaska Board of Regents, a proposal was prepared by Dr. Akasofu in collaboration with the U.S. Arctic Research Commission and submitted to the Japanese government via the U.S. State Department in the fall of 1995.
The government of Japan and the government of the United States, together with the State of Alaska, jointly agreed to establish IARC on the UAF campus as a project of the Common Agenda, which was signed by President Clinton and Prime Minister Hashimoto in March 1997. The basic principle of the Common Agenda is “… to demonstrate our ability to solve, jointly, problems that are beyond what any one nation can address.” (Joint Communiqué of May 2, 1997). Climate change had become an important subject, and one that urgently needed to be studied on an international basis.
The opening ceremony for the IARC building was held on August 27, 1999. Subsequently, the National Science Board authorized then NSF director Rita Colwell to negotiate a Cooperative Agreement with UAF on the operation of IARC.
The IARC building was officially named the Syun-Ichi Akasofu Building on April 27, 2007.
