Northern Sea Route open for business?

The innovative shipping company that first experimented in wind power for its fleet, may become the first shipping company to utilize the Northern Sea Route for commercial use.  Beluga Shipping currently has two vessels transiting along the Northern coast of Russia from Vladivostok to the Siberian outpost Novyy Port where the ships will offload equipment for a power plant project in Siberia.  After the cargo is offloaded, and if conditions permit, the three ships will continue heading towards Murmansk, and then to Rotterdam.  If successful, this would mark the first time a commercial vessel has crossed from Asia to Europe through the Arctic on a commercial voyage without the assistance of icebreakers.

Arctic Sea Routes - Sea routes along the edges of the Arctic ocean, or rather along the coasts of Northern Canada and Russia, holds potential for decreasing the number of days in shipping goods from the Pacific to Atlantic coasts in Europe and North America, and vice versa. In addition, this could provide a means to transport natural resources, such as oil and gas, extracted in the Arctic. Currently these routes have not been possible to use this, due to the ice conditions, but with decreases in ice - due to climate change - this could provide a new possibility. In addition, this would mean increased risk for the sensitive wilderness areas along these coasts, with oil spills and pollution. Please note that Northern Sea Route was previously known as Northeast passage. (Hugo Ahlenius, UNEP/GRID-Arendal)

Niels Stolberg, president and CEO of Bremen-based Beluga Shipping confirmed with Reuters that two of the ships, Beluga Fraternity and the Beluga Foresight are scheduled to arrive in Novyy Port on or about the 6th of September.  The National Snow and Ice data center which studies and predicts ice coverage in both the Northwest Passage and Northern Sea Route is predicting that although the Northwest Passage is still chocked with ice, the Northern Sea Route may actually be open in the next few weeks, which will bode well for the Beluga Group.

The National Snow and Ice Data center made the following statement concerning this year’s arctic shipping routes:

So far this year, neither the Northwest Passage nor the Northern Sea Route has opened. The Northern Sea Route appears likely to open soon, but ice still clogs many of the channels in the Northwest Passage.

Whether or not the navigational passages through the Arctic Ocean will open in a given summer depends on atmospheric circulation and ice thickness. For example, although 2007 was a record low extent in the Arctic and the Northwest Passage was nearly completely open, the Northern Sea Route was still choked with ice because of a circulation pattern that pushed a tongue of ice against the Siberian coast. Recent research by Stephen Howell at the University of Waterloo in Canada shows that whether the Northwest Passage clears depends less on how much melt occurs, and more on whether multi-year sea ice is pushed into the channels. Counterintuitively, as the ice cover thins, ice may flow more easily into the channels, preventing the Northwest Passage from regularly opening in coming decades.

The map of sea ice concentration from AMSR-E from August 16, 2009 shows ice clogging many of the channels of the Canadian Archipelago. The Northern Sea Route may be clear in the next few weeks. NASA AMSR-E data. —Credit: From National Snow and Ice Data Center, courtesy IUP, University of Bremen, Germany

Previously, the Northern Sea Route was opened by receding ice in 2005 but was closed by 2007. The amount of polar ice had receded to 2005 levels in August 2008. Images from the NASA Aqua satellite revealed that the last ice blockage of the Northern Sea Route in the Laptev Sea had melted by late August 2008, the first time in 125,000 years that both the Northwest Passage and Northern Sea Route had been open simultaneously.

Related Posts:

The Arctic Danger – Are ships in the Arctic Dangerous?

Links of Interest:

Era of Trans-Arctic Shipping Nigh – NY Times

Northern Sea Route User Conference

The Numbers are in!  2008 Arctic Sea Ice Retreat – Gcaptain

Climate Change Opens Arctic’s Northeast Passage – Reuters