Climate change: Arctic sea ice recedes, creating voyages

The Arctic is now open for business all year round after a large commercial ship sailed the Northern Sea Routes from Jiangsu, China, to a Russian gas plant on the North Coast, for the first time ever during February, when winter temperatures were normal. makes the icy waterway impassable.

The tanker, owned by the Russian maritime shipping company Sovcomflot, was able to undertake the voyage through the Arctic sea ice because it was no longer frozen all winter due to the global warming caused by humans.

The ability to undertake this voyage 365 days a year offers many new possibilities for the shipping industry, which transports 80 percent of the world’s cargo by volume and 70 percent of world trade by value. But it also raises concerns about how the hassle of exploiting the new route could advance geopolitics.

To gain a better understanding of what this new possibility in the Arctic means to the rest of the world, I spoke to Juliette Kayyem, Belfer senior lecturer in international security at Harvard Kennedy School.

Kayyem served in the Obama administration as Assistant Secretary for Intergovernmental Affairs at the Department of Homeland Security, where she played a key role in dealing with major operations, including the government’s response to the 2010 BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Kayyem responded Twitter to the news about the historic journey of the Arctic tanker, and writes that the moment is “so consequent that you can not get your head over it.” To find out more why she thinks it’s so monumental, I called her. Our discussion, edited for length and clarity, is below.

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Jariel Arvin

What exactly has changed with this news?

Juliette Kayyem

In the past, trade had to work in a north-to-south manner, simply because the Arctic had never been navigated. Now ships from Europe to China can go on an east-west route. This will put more competition on the north-south corridors to maintain their commercial activity.

Eighty percent of the world’s goods by volume are shipped by cargo, so this is no joke. For 100 years, the cargo essentially followed the same path through the Suez Canal. Thus, with days that cut through transit time, as well as [not having to pay] all the taxes and fees associated with being a port city or canal like the Panama Canal and the Suez Canal – it’s going to change everything.

Jariel Arvin

For example, how does it change how a Chinese cargo ship would have traveled?

Juliette Kayyem

To do Europe alone, China would have passed from the Netherlands through the Suez Canal – south of India, to China to Dalian, which is their main territory. If you look at the trail now, it is cut in half. Now you can go the northern route, east down. This is amazing.

Jariel Arvin

So, Russia and China are obviously going to be interested in moving goods through that Northern Sea Route. Which other countries will compete for an interest?

Juliette Kayyem

Japan, Vietnam, Russia, almost every country. Australia is going to want to go through there. I mean, why wouldn’t they, because it’s so much shorter? Now there is going to be pressure and competition. Now you are just [opened up] a big, big competitive market.

Jariel Arvin

What about the US?

Juliette Kayyem

Because the United States does not really sign more treaties, the United States does not sign the Law of the Sea. But we are a member of the Arctic Council, which is a kind of ad hoc [international] system to try to handle everything in the Arctic, from whom has access to which minerals [how to manage] traffic.

Jariel Arvin

What do you think will be the impact of this new competition?

Juliette Kayyem

There are two pieces: the environmental piece and the geopolitical piece. For the environment, it is the equivalent of an ocean opening up. The waters are going to move like it has not moved before. The ice is melting in ways that mean the water has to go somewhere, and that will cause sea levels to rise, affecting coastal cities around the world.

And the role of human activity in accelerating this change is unmistakable. Global warming has significantly affected the Arctic. As I wrote for the Boston Globe, it was about a decade ago that things started to change there in the sense that countries would position themselves to take over.

You are going to start seeing cruise lines. It’s beautiful up there. This is why I even started feeling ten years ago – anticipating nausea is how I would describe it – anticipating because we knew that the opening of the North Pole would happen to all kinds of traffic, and nauseous, because there is no doubt that human-caused climate change has had a major impact.

Jariel Arvin

What do you think the future holds for the Arctic in terms of geopolitics?

Juliette Kayyem

You are going to have many countries with a lot of interest, without a lot of management and with a lot of traffic. And this is trouble for me as a security person.

Jariel Arvin

Why is this trouble?

Juliette Kayyem

Well, that raises a number of questions that raise concerns about national security. One is: who gets which routes when? And who gets where to drill? Let us now say a bunch of geologists discover that there is a massive oil field much further away so that no land ownership of the well. So who gets bored?

Jariel Arvin

Who is currently in charge of helping manage this international tension in the North Pole?

Juliette Kayyem

These are the kind of issues that the Arctic Council is going to have to deal with. It will also cover things like offshore drilling, mineral ownership, traffic and who needs to go apply first, all of which are difficult. Accidents are a big problem. What if there was an accident? There are going to be a lot of problems to address now.

Jariel Arvin

Is there anything to do with this new reality?

Juliette Kayyem

I think this new reality will mean greater US involvement in the Arctic, so it’s going to be a big leadership test for the Biden presidency, because it’s an issue that we need to counter Russia and China.

It will also be a big moment for John Kerry, who is campaigning for a larger Arctic government against a Republican Senate when he was Secretary of State and could not succeed. This is something Kerry has focused on for a long time. And now, with the environmental hat as Biden’s climate envoy, the potential for him to get it done is much greater.