At the end of May, a ship named the Christophe de Margerie slipped out of Utrenneye, a port on the flat, treeless Siberian coast of the Kara Sea in the Arctic.
uncertain
ship → name → Arctic
At 299 metres – roughly the length of three football pitches – the large ship is named after a French oil executive who was killed in a freak accident at Moscow’s Vnukovo Airport in 2014.
asserted
who → name → 2014
She is a liquified natural gas carrier (LNG) whose insulated tanks can hold more than 170,000 cubic metres of gas.
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tanks → liquify → gas
The Christophe de Margerie is an icebreaker too: it has a reinforced double hull and three independently rotating propulsion units that allow the ship to force its way through ice more than two metres thick.
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ship → have → ice
These are essential to use remote terminals – such as Utrenneye – that conventional carriers cannot reach for much of the year.
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carriers → use → year
The ship sailed east after it had loaded, escorted along the coast by a Russian nuclear-powered icebreaker.
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it → sail → icebreaker
According to ship-tracking data, on June 8 it passed through the Bering Strait before continuing on to a floating storage unit off the Kamchatka peninsula to deposit its cargo – almost certainly for onward delivery to China.
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it → accord → China
It was not the first time that the ship has made the journey along what is usually referred to as the Northern Sea route, but it is the first time a commercial vessel is known to have done so this early in the year: until June, the ice is normally too thick to contemplate such a voyage.
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ice → make → voyage
A major reorganisation of the world’s climate is not just leading to unusually warm summers in Britain; it is also leading to geopolitical changes that are having – and will have – enormous implications for trade routes, for the global economy and for national security.
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that → lead → security
Danish solders in Greenland, which Donald Trump has effectively declared a blank canvas for American territorial expansion
Last week, Donald Trump effectively declared Greenland a blank canvas for American territorial expansion.
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Greenland → declare → expansion
He signed an agreement with Denmark that apparently grants the US total control over Greenland’s security, meaning the US can now build new military bases there ‘as needed’ according to Fox News.
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US → sign → News
Whether the American President’s braggadocio survives publication of the deal’s fine print remains to be seen, for Danish commentators have been quick to point out that America has long had a free military hand in Greenland.
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America → survive → Greenland
But Trump’s covetousness of the Arctic island isn’t misplaced, as over the next few decades the barren, ice-covered reaches of the High North are set to become a geopolitical crucible of vital trade routes, military brawn and superpower rivalry.
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reaches → misplace → routes
Map of the Northern Sea Route shows why the High North could become a military flashpoint
For centuries, the idea of a northern short cut to Asia pre-occupied and fascinated sailors.
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idea → show → sailors
The twin discoveries of routes across the Atlantic and around the southern tip of Africa into the Indian Ocean in the 1490s had opened up new geographies and opportunities, paving the way for trade to become truly global.
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trade → open → way
Although the discovery of the Americas had extraordinary consequences, it was the routes to Asia that were more rewarding.
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that → have → Asia
Then, as now, Asia was home to large populations, wealthy cities and riches waiting to be tapped.
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Asia → wait → populations
Until the early 1500s, trade had reached Europe through networks that have come to be called the Silk Roads – land and maritime connections that wove peoples together from China and India through the Middle East and East Africa.
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that → reach → East
The main beneficiary was Venice, whose wealth allowed the greatest families to build magnificent palaces rising out of the lagoon at the northern end of the Adriatic Sea.
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families → allow → Sea
For those in northern and western Europe, finding the quickest way to Asia was important, both for speed but also for security: the journey round Africa and the Cape of Good Hope was long and could be treacherous – and furthermore involved sailing close to Spain and Portugal, whose ships dominated the Atlantic, at least initially.
By the 1550s, English expeditions were attempting to find a route through the northeast passage – skirting the northern coast of Scandinavia, into Russian waters and beyond to the Far East.
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expeditions → find → East
They were followed by the Dutch whose merchants were determined to find new ways to reach Asian markets.
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merchants → follow → markets
Willem Barents went furthest, reaching Novaya Zemlya – the vast archipelago in the far north, beyond Scandinavia, considered the easternmost point of Europe – in 1596.
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Barents → go → 1596
His ship got trapped and ultimately crushed by ice as the seas froze in the winter.
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seas → trap → winter
Barents and his crew survived over the bitterly cold months that followed, building a makeshift hut from timber and other materials they salvaged from their ship – only to die from sickness on his attempt to reach home the following year.
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they → survive → attempt
The body of water that lies at the western gateway to the Arctic still bears his name: the Barents Sea.
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that → lie → name
The ice-breaking ship Christophe de Margerie is named after a French oil executive who was killed in a freak accident at Moscow’s Vnukovo airport in 2014
Other attempts fared little better, with the first successful transit not happening until the 1870s when the Finnish-Swedish aristocrat Erik Nordenskjold sailed eastwards, almost reaching the Bering Strait before ice closed around his vessel, the Vega.
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ice → break → vessel
Its specially reinforced hull survived the pressure and remained trapped for almost nine months before the ice melted and the ship continued on, through the strait and down Russia’s Far East coast to Yokohama in Japan.
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ship → reinforce → Japan
Three things have changed today.
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things → change → ?
First, improved technologies mean that ships – such as the Christophe de Margerie – can now push their way through ice during the summer months with relative ease.
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ships → improve → ease
Second, warming conditions mean that ice is thinner and more broken up; indeed, some stretches are now increasingly ice-free for long durations in the summer.
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stretches → warm → summer
Although there is some discussion about future projections, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change suggests that the Arctic Ocean will experience its first practically ice-free summer by 2050.
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Ocean → be → 2050
One recent study suggested this will happen as early as the 2030s given current warming patterns.
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this → suggest → patterns
This has major implications for shipping and trade.
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This → have → shipping
Since the early 1990s, much of global manufacturing has moved to China, powering a period of astonishing growth and rising ambition.
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much → move → growth
For those who buy
Chinese-made goods in Europe, the Northern Sea route promises quicker deliveries and lower prices: a journey from Shanghai to Felixstowe currently involves 11,000 miles and takes 35 days – involving a long route across the Indian Ocean, through the Suez
Canal and then transiting the Strait of Gibraltar.
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journey → buy → Gibraltar
The new northern route is much shorter: last year, Spirit of Istanbul sailed from Ningbo to Felixstowe in just 21 days on a journey almost 30 per cent shorter at just 8,000 miles.
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Spirit → sail → miles
That means a quicker turn-around; it also means less fuel.
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it → mean → fuel
Both mean reduced costs and better returns on capital.
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Both → mean → capital
It is also a key part of a major reconfiguration that involves the world’s sea lanes, its trading patterns and changing priorities.
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that → involve → lanes
The 575ft-long Dubai Tower was the first Chinese cargo ship to arrive in the UK via the Arctic in August last year
In 2005, Yang Huigen, one of China’s leading polar scientists, gave an interview in which he said that the country should aspire to become a ‘polar great power’.
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country → arrive → which
…and 41 more, not listed.
The Aporia
