Melting polar ice fuels dollar dreams for many
The latest study of the Arctic ice cap—finding that it faded this summer
to its smallest size ever recorded—is beginning to make Pat Broe,a Denver entrepreneur ,look like a visionary for buying this derelict Hudson Bay port from the Canadian government in 1997.Especially at the price he paid: About $7 .
By Broe’s calculations, Churchill could bring in as much as $100 million a year as a port on Arctic
shipping lanes shorter by thousands of miles than routes to the south ,and traffic would only increase as the retreat of ice in the region clears the way for a longer shipping season.
With major companies and nations adopting similar logic, the Arctic is seeing a great rush for virgin territory and natural resources worth hundreds of billions of dollars .Even before the polar ice began shrinking each summer, countries were pushing into the frigid Barents Sea, lured by undersea oil and gas fields and emboldened by advances in technology. But now, as thinning ice stands to simplify construction of drilling rigs, exploration is likely to move even farther north.
Last year ,scientists found tantalizing hints of oil in seabed samples just 200miles from the North Pole .All told, one quarter of the World’s undiscovered oil and gas resources lies in the Arctic , according to the US Geological Survey. The polar thaw is also starting to unlock other treasures :lucrative shipping routes, perhaps even the storied North west Passage; new cruise ship destinations ; and important commercial fisheries .It’s positive side of global war-ming ,if there is a positive side said Ron Lemieux, the transportation minister of Manitoba, which is investing millions in Churchill.
If the melting continues the mass of floating ice may largely disappear for entire summers .Instead of the white wilderness the world would have a blue pole on top ,a seasonally open sea nearly five times the size of the Mediterranean .But if the Arctic is no longer a frozen backyard, the fences matter .For now it is not clear where those fences are .Under a treaty
called the United National’s Convention on the Law of the Sea territory is determined by how far a nation’s continental shelf extends into the sea. Under the treaty, countries have limited time after ratifying it to map the seafloor and make claims.
Rudyard Kipling called jockeying among world powers in Central Asia the Great Game. Christopher Weafer, an energy analyst with Alfa Bank in Moscow says this new Arctic rush is the Great Game in a cold climate.