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Arctic Ocean News

12 Mar 2024

Cosco Shipping Enhances Safety with Iridium GMDSS

Source: Iridium Communications

Iridium Communications has announced Cosco Shipping (CSSC), the world's largest fleet of commercial vessels with 1,417 ships, has begun installation of Iridium® Global Maritime Distress and Safety System (GMDSS) terminals.The recent installation of the Lars Thrane LT-3100S terminal on the Cosco Tengfei is a testament to CSSC always prioritizing the safety of its crew, ships, and cargo, says Iridium.The Cosco Tengfei is a modern pure car and truck carrier (PCTC) vessel capable of transporting up to 5,000 vehicles.

22 Dec 2023

Lack of Arctic Tankers Puts Russia's LNG Development Dreams on Ice

© KKF / Adobe Stock

Russia is hoping its shipments of liquefied natural gas (LNG) will offset a sharp fall in pipeline gas exports to Europe, but a shortage of gas tankers and sanctions hold back its plans, analysts and industry sources said.Russia wants to boost its share of the LNG market to 20% by 2030 from 8% now, but a force majeure declaration by top producer Novatek over LNG supplies from its future Arctic LNG 2 project due to sanctions shows the hurdles it faces.Novatek's announcement comes after the United States last month imposed sanctions on Arctic LNG 2…

16 Aug 2023

MARAD Designates Two New Marine Highway Routes

(Photo: Eric Haun)

Two new routes have been designated under the U.S. Marine Highway Program (MHP), U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg announced this week during a visit to Alaska.The newly designated M-11 in Alaska will add over 6,500 miles to the marine highway system, and the M-79 route extends the reach of the Ohio River system by nearly 250 miles in Pennsylvania and West Virginia. These designations allow any eligible applicant on these routes to apply for future U.S. Marine Highway Program grants…

14 Aug 2023

US Coast Guard Cutter Healy, Scientists Deploy Ice Stations

Researchers set up instruments to begin data collection on an ice floe next to USCGC Healy in the Beaufort Sea, Aug. 6, 2023. (Photo: Zane Miagany / U.S. Coast Guard)

U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Healy (WAGB 20) crew and embarked researchers ventured onto a floe of multi-year ice for the first of three multi-instrument ice stations in the Arctic Ocean Basin late July and early August.As the Healy carefully approached and maintained position alongside an ice floe above 77 degrees north, the crew and a team of scientists, working in cooperation with the Office of Naval Research, (ONR) offloaded a diverse collection of equipment on to the floe carefully…

06 Jun 2023

Arctic Ocean Could Be Ice-free In Summer By 2030s, Scientists Say

© Danita Delimont / Adobe Stock

The Arctic Ocean could be ice-free in summer by the 2030s, even if we do a good job of reducing emissions between now and then. That’s the worrying conclusion of a new study in Nature Communications.Predictions of an ice-free Arctic Ocean have a long and complicated history, and the 2030s is sooner than most scientists had thought possible (though it is later than some had wrongly forecast). What we know for sure is the disappearance of sea ice at the top of the world would not only be an emblematic sign of climate breakdown…

13 Mar 2023

Biden Administration to Designate 2.8 Million Acres in Arctic Ocean off-limits for Oil and Gas Leasing

©DOI

The U.S. Department of the Interior said Monday that President Biden would take action to designate about 2.8 million acres in the Arctic Ocean nearshore the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A) as indefinitely off-limits for future oil and gas leasing. This action will complete protections for the entire Beaufort Sea Planning Area, building upon President Obama’s 2016 withdrawal under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act to protect the Chukchi Sea Planning Area and the majority of the Beaufort Sea…

04 Oct 2022

US Coast Guard Cutter Healy Reaches the North Pole

(Photo: Deborah Heldt Cordone / U.S. Coast Guard)

The U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Healy (WAGB 20) reached the North Pole Friday after traversing the frozen Arctic Ocean, marking only the second time a U.S. ship has reached the location unaccompanied, the first being Healy in 2015.Healy, a medium icebreaker, and crew departed Dutch Harbor, Alaska, Sept. 4, beginning their journey to reach latitude 90 degrees north. The cutter and crew supported oceanographic research in collaboration with National Science Foundation-funded scientists…

19 Sep 2022

Russia Conducts Military Drills in the Arctic Sea

(Photo: Russian Defense Ministry)

Russian nuclear-powered submarines fired cruise missiles in the Arctic on Friday as part of military drills designed to test Moscow's readiness for a possible conflict in its icy northern waters, the defense ministry said.The drills, named Umka-2022, took place in the Chukchi Sea, an eastern stretch of the Arctic Ocean that separates Russia from the U.S. state of Alaska.Russia sees its vast Arctic territory as a vital strategic interest and has been building up its military capabilities in the region for years…

15 Aug 2022

FerryBox: PONANT Exploration Vessel Collecting Arctic Ocean Data

©PONANT-Mike Louagie

PONANT’s new science-focused exploration vessel has started collecting Arctic Ocean data with -4H-JENA engineering’s FerryBox multi-parameter water measurement system on board.The system is now being used to evaluate the role of global warming and glacial meltwater on the rising level of oxygen in the oceans aboard PONANT’s Le Commandant Charcot, the world’s only luxury icebreaker, a hybrid-electric vessel powered by liquified natural gas.A unique concept with minimal environmental impact due to her green energy and propulsion systems…

01 Aug 2022

On Navy Day, Putin Says US is Main Threat to Russia

© rarrarorro / Adobe Stock

President Vladimir Putin on Sunday signed a new naval doctrine which cast the United States as Russia's main rival and set out Russia's global maritime ambitions for crucial areas such as the Arctic and in the Black Sea.Speaking on Russia's Navy Day in the former imperial capital of St Petersburg founded by Tsar Peter the Great, Putin praised Peter for making Russia a great sea power and increasing the global standing of the Russian state.After inspecting the navy, Putin made a short speech in which he promised that what he touted as Russia's unique Zircon hypersonic cruise missiles…

27 Jun 2022

Melting Arctic Ice Could Transform International Shipping Routes -Study

© Nightman1965 / Adobe Stock

Melting ice in the Arctic Ocean could yield new trade routes in international waters, reducing the shipping industry’s carbon footprint and weakening Russia’s control over trade routes through the Arctic, a study found.With climate change rapidly warming the world’s oceans, the future of the Arctic Ocean looks grim. Climate models show that parts of the Arctic that were once covered in ice year-round are warming so quickly that they will be reliably ice-free for months on end in as few as two decades.

22 May 2022

Op-ed: Building on Don Young’s Legacy of Protecting Alaska Oceans

© Lars Johansson / Adobe Stock

May 22 marks National Maritime Day. Congress established it in 1933 in commemoration of the steam ship Savannah and her maiden voyage, which was the first trans-Atlantic journey ever made by a steam-powered vessel. In the 203 years since the Savannah departed her eponymous port in Georgia for Liverpool, England, oceangoing technology has come a long way – and maritime shipping has become a supply-chain backbone that keeps goods arriving from all over the world. Much of this shipping…

31 Jan 2022

Cool Summer: Northern Sea Route Remains Closed for the First Time in 12 Years

Credit: Weathernews

Weathernews Inc. Global Ice Center announced its review of Arctic Ocean sea ice conditions during 2021. Due to the cool summer temperatures in July 2021, sea ice did not see much melt and the minimum sea ice area for the year was the largest in the past seven years at 4.61 million km2.Weathernews Inc. Global Ice Center said Monday that both the Northeast (Russian side) and the Northwest (Canadian side) Passages of the Northern Sea Route remained closed. This is the first time in 12 years since 2009 that the Northeast Passage did not open.

23 Dec 2021

UAF’s GINA Provides a Guiding Hand in Arctic Ocean Research

The Sikuliaq, a 261-ft. ice-capable research vessel operated by UAF, pauses in the Arctic Ocean in June 2021 during its fifth year of operation. Photo by Ethan Roth

The research vessel Sikuliaq navigated among and around the chunks and slabs of Arctic sea ice above Alaska for several weeks on two voyages this fall, breaking through frozen slabs when it had to, just as its sturdy hull is designed to do. It's now on a third trip.The Sikuliaq, a 261-ft. ice-capable research vessel operated by UAF, pauses in the Arctic Ocean in June 2021 during its fifth year of operation. A few months later, it traveled farther north than ever before — almost 500 miles beyond Point Barrow.Satellite imagery produced at the Geographic Information Network of Alaska…

15 Dec 2021

Ships Traveling the Thawing Arctic are Leaving Garbage in Their Wake

© Parilov / Adobe Stock

Following another year of stark climate impacts in the Arctic, scientists warned Tuesday of a new scourge hitting the region: marine trash.With the region warming twice as fast as the rest of the world, sea ice that has long blanketed the Arctic Ocean is disappearing, opening new routes to shipping. Scientists began noticing the trash bobbing in the icy water or piling up on Alaska Bering Strait-area beaches last year.“That’s a direct result of increased human maritime activities…

23 Sep 2021

Arctic Shipping Requires New Ways to Manage Risks

© Silver/AdobeStock

In February 2021, LNG carrier Christophe de Margerie, escorted by a nuclear icebreaker, became the first large-capacity cargo vessel to transit the eastern sector of the Northern Sea Route (NSR). The voyage demonstrated that year-round safe navigation is possible along the entire length of the Northern Sea Route (NSR).In the last five years, cargo traffic along the NSR has grown almost fivefold, reaching 33 million tons in 2020. Last year, there were 64 voyages on the NSR compared with 37 in 2019.

03 Jun 2021

TotalEnergies Buys Stake in Novatek's Arctic Transshipment

(Photo: TotalEnergies)

TotalEnergies has signed a sale and purchase agreement with Novatek to acquire 10% of Arctic Transshipment LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Novatek, which owns and will operate two liquefied natural gas (LNG) transshipment terminals being built in the Murmansk and Kamchatka regions of Russia.These terminals will provide export logistics services, including to the Arctic LNG 2 project under construction, and will each initially include a 360,000 m3 floating storage unit (FSU) and two ship-to-ship transfer kits (STS).

01 Apr 2021

The Value of Friends in “High-Latitude” Places

 Mooring retrieved on board the Svalbard (photo credit: Daniel Fatnes of the Norwegian Coast Guard)

Who do you call when you need a job done on short notice, in total darkness, under 100-percent ice cover, thousands of meters at the bottom of the sea? In the case of the U.S. Office of Naval Research (ONR), you call your friends in Norway.That is exactly what the Chief of Naval Research Rear Admiral Lorin C. Selby did when he enlisted the help of the Norwegian Coast Guard icebreaker and offshore patrol vessel, the CGV Svalbard, to retrieve oceanographic moorings containing irreplaceable data.

29 Mar 2021

Suez Canal Shutdown Shows Value of Northern Sea Route, Russia Says

© vasilevich / Adobe Stock

Russia’s energy ministry said on Monday a stranded container ship blocking Egypt’s Suez Canal has highlighted the safety and sustainability of its Northern Sea Route (NSR) and Russian energy pipelines.These “are highly secure and hold competitive positions in terms of transportation costs as well as by reliability in comparison to alternative routes”, the ministry said.Russia expects cargoes to increase through the Northern Sea Route, an Arctic Ocean route to Asia which trims 4,000 nautical miles off the southern alternative via the Suez Canal.Volumes reached almost 33 million tonnes last year

01 Mar 2021

Russia Launches Satellite to Monitor Climate in Arctic

(Credit: Roscosmos)

Russia launched its space satellite Arktika-M on Sunday on a mission to monitor the climate and environment in the Arctic amid a push by the Kremlin to expand the country’s activities in the region.The Arctic has warmed more than twice as fast as the global average over the last three decades and Moscow is seeking to develop the energy-rich region, investing in the Northern Sea Route for shipping across its long northern flank as ice melts.The satellite successfully reached its intended orbit after being launched from Kazakhstan’s Baikonur cosmodrome by a Soyuz rocket…

18 Jan 2021

New Study Finds Polyester Fibers Throughout the Arctic Ocean

The Canadian Coast Guard Ship Louis S. St. Laurent transiting the Arctic Ocean. This expedition between Norway and Canada collected seawater samples for microplastics analysis. (Photo: Arthi Ramachandra / Fisheries and Oceans Canada)

The Arctic has long proven to be a barometer of the health of our planet. This remote part of the world faces unprecedented environmental assaults, as climate change and industrial chemicals threaten a way of life for Inuit and other Indigenous and northern communities that rely heavily on seafood and marine mammals for food.But who would have imagined that the clothes we wear might add to this onslaught? Evidence increasingly shows that tiny synthetic fibers are permeating the Arctic Ocean and finding their way into zooplankton…

12 Jan 2021

SMM's Offshore Dialogue: The Value Of Wind And Water

Alfred-Wegener-Institut_Michael Gutsche (CC-BY 4.0)_Polarstern MOSAiC Expedition

At the SMM Hamburg's Offshore Dialogue online conference on February 2, international experts will discuss current trends in the offshore wind farms segment, technical challenges facing tidal and wave energy conversion, and innovative ocean monitoring technologies."About 70% of our planet is covered by water. The Earth's oceans play a key role in shaping the global climate. The more important it is to gather and evaluate as much information as possible about the composition of this ecosystem and how it changes.

19 Nov 2020

US Moves to Loosen Safety Rules for Arctic Offshore Drilling

(File photo: U.S. Coast Guard courtesy of Air Station Port Angeles)

The Trump administration on Thursday proposed to loosen Obama-era safety regulations for the oil industry in the Arctic Ocean off Alaska to ease the way for petroleum extraction in the region, an effort that President-elect Joe Biden will likely throw out once in office.The proposal would revise a suite of Obama-era rules crafted to improve safety in the extreme conditions of the Arctic after a Shell drilling rig ran aground there in 2012. The company later abandoned oil exploration in the region and there are no active drilling operations there.Now, much of the U.S.

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