Yahoo News on 12 October 2019 reported the following -
Melting Ice Redraws the World Map and Starts a Power
Struggle
Bloomberg Marc Champion, Bloomberg 23 hours ago
(Bloomberg) -- Melting ice is opening access to new energy
resources faster than predicted, prompting a nascent great power struggle in
the Arctic as the political and economic map of the world is transformed.
That, at least, is one picture that's being sharply drawn at
this weekend’s Arctic Circle Assembly in Iceland, a kind of Davos for the far
north. The seven-year-old event is the largest annual forum for politicians,
scientists, environmentalists and others to talk about the Arctic, including
climate change, security and the exploitation of new oil and gas discoveries.
U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry called for “free nations”
to resist attempts from those “that seek to dominate the Arctic from the
outside,” an apparent reference to China, which calls itself a “near Arctic”
power. Speaking at Thursday’s opening session, he also warned against countries
trying to do the same through energy sales, an oblique dig at Russia.
Yet the attempt to rally U.S. allies faces an uphill battle
as the Arctic emerges as a potential 21st century geopolitical flash-point in
the way transportation routes like the Suez Canal were in the 20th.
Perry was followed on stage by Dmitry Artyukhov, the
governor of the Yamal-Nenets region in Russia. He spelled out the growing
international involvement in his region’s new and planned liquefied natural gas
fields.
In the three years from 2016 to 2018, these have quadrupled
Russia’s share of the global LNG market to 8%, from 2%, with much more growth
to come. Investors so far include Total SA of France, CNOOC Ltd. and China
National Petroleum Corp. of China, and Mitsui & Co. and Japan Oil, Gas and
Metals National Corporation, of Japan. Further projects are already approved.
South Korea, meanwhile, is building ice-hardened LNG
supertankers to ship the gas, at more than $300 million apiece. They can only
deliver to Asia when Russia’s Northern Sea Route is relatively ice free. Still,
this year it became navigable in August and traffic is still passing in
October. The time-frame for when the passage will be consistently ice free is
shrinking all the time. [sic]
Artyukhov was followed by a double act of diplomats from
China and U.S. treaty ally South Korea, who talked about their tight trilateral
cooperation on Arctic affairs with another U.S. treaty ally, Japan.
Asked if China might stop calling itself a near Arctic state
in the light of U.S. opposition, Gao Feng, special representative for Arctic
affairs in China’s foreign ministry, said simply: “No.”
“We see
the emergence in front of our eyes of a new economic, business and political
map,” said former Iceland President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson, who founded and
chairs the Arctic Circle Assembly.
“What is
happening now is first, the emergence of Asia as the leading source of economic
growth in the 21st century, and second, the opening up of the Arctic which,
combined with new technologies, is creating access to the oil and gas to supply
that growth,” he said in an interview just ahead of the conference in the
Icelandic capital Reykjavik.
That emerging new world order was mapped out in a slide show
on Friday morning by Henry Tillman, who runs Grisons Peak LLP, a London-based
investment bank, and its research arm, China Investment Research. Projected
onto the conference hall’s giant screen, he called it “Paving the Polar Silk Road.”
The Polar Silk Road is part of China’s Belt and Road
Initiative and aims to reduce its trade logistics costs. Not only is the
Northern Sea Route much shorter than current energy shipping lanes to Asia via
the Indian Ocean and Suez Canal, there’s also less political risk, Tillman
said. There’s nothing like the Strait of Hormuz in the Gulf, for example, where
tension with Iran has escalated.
The U.S. has ambitions of its own to become one of the
world’s leading LNG exporters. It’s projected to be producing 100 million tons
of LNG by 2024, to Russia’s 63 million tons, but could face higher extraction
and transport costs to get to export markets in Asia and Europe, according to
Tillman.
That explains the aggressive stance the U.S. has taken against
a planned natural gas pipeline from Russia to Europe and toward Russia and
China’s activities in the Arctic, said Grimsson, Iceland’s president from 1996
to 2016.
Shawn Bennett, deputy assistant secretary for oil and
natural gas at the Department of Energy, said the U.S. was not concerned about
competition. Growth projections for natural gas demand in India and other Asian
countries are so high, and the need for supply diversification in Europe so
acute that there’s little risk of a glut, he told Bloomberg. “Global demand for
LNG is just going to grow,” he said.
The U.S. may be pushing back in more concrete ways. On
September 30, the Department of the Treasury imposed sanctions on units of
China’s Cosco Shipping Corp., over alleged breaches of U.S. sanctions against
Iran. The move immediately hit the Yamal project’s LNG tanker routes because of Cosco’s share in one of the
main shipping companies involved.
Still, for those who have been working in the Arctic for a
long time, much of the geopolitical discussion sounds a little breathless. Last
year, Russia’s Northern Sea Route carried 29 million tons of cargo, with
projections rising to 90 million. The Suez Canal carries about 1 billion tons.
Ice floes are unpredictable even when retreating, and insurable
risks for shipping through the polar ice can be significantly higher than in
warmer seas, according to Janne Valkonen, who specializes in engineering ships
and oil rigs for cold weather at DNV GL Group, a provider of maritime risk
services.
“Disputes, race, scramble – stop using these terms,” said
Liv Monica Stubholt, a Norwegian lawyer with the firm Selmer AS, who advises
companies on Arctic issues “There is no scramble for the Arctic. The biggest
problem my clients have is attracting investment.”
（彭博）- 融冰正在以比預期更快的速度開放獲取新能源的途徑，隨著世界政治和經濟格局的變化，在北極引發了新生的大國鬥爭。
至少，這是本週末在冰島的北極圈大會上被透彻地繪製出的一幅写照，這是遙遠北方的達沃斯。這個成立了七年的活動是政治家，科學家，環保主義者和其他人談論北極的最大的年度論壇，包括氣候變化，安全性和新油氣發現的開發。
美國能源部長里克·佩里（Rick
Perry）呼籲“自由國家”抵制那些“試圖從外部統治北極”的企圖，這顯然是指中國，中國自稱為“近北極”大國。在周四的開幕式上，他還警告各國不要試圖通過能源銷售來達到同樣效應，這是對俄羅斯的一種間接嘲諷。
然而，北極成為21世紀潛在的地緣政治爆發點，将使試圖集結美國盟國的努力面臨艱鉅的戰鬥。正如在20世紀蘇伊士運河出現成为運輸路線。
佩里之後是俄羅斯亞馬爾·涅涅茨地區總督德米特里·阿秋霍夫（Dmitry
Artyukhov）上台。他詳細說明了國際對該地區新的及在計劃中的液化天然氣田的參與。
從2016年到2018年的三年中，俄羅斯在全球液化天然氣市場中的份額從2％增長到了8％，並会有更多的增长。迄今為止，投資者包括法國道達爾公司，中海油有限公司和中國石油天然氣集團公司，以及日本的三井物產和日本石油天然氣金屬公司。更多的項目已經被批准。
與此同時，韓國正在建造冰硬化的液化天然氣超級油輪，以運送天然氣，每艘造價超過3億美元。它們只能在俄羅斯的北海航線在相對無冰的時候才进行運送到亞洲。不過，今年八月已能通航，十月仍能暢通無阻。通道始終保持無冰狀態的時間框架一直在縮小 [sic]。
阿圖霍夫（Artyukhov）之後是來自中國和美國的條約盟國 - 韓國 - 的外交官的雙重行動，他們談到一起與另一美國條約盟國日本在北極事務上的緊密三邊合作。
當被問及中國是否會根據美國的反對而不再自稱是北極國家時，中國外交部北極事務特別代表高峰簡單地說：“不。”
創建北極圈議會並擔任主席的冰島前總統奧拉維爾·拉格納·格里姆森說“我們看到了新的經濟，商業和政治地圖的出現” 。
他在會前在冰島首都雷克雅未克接受采訪時說 “現在發生的事情是，首先，亞洲成為21世紀經濟增長的主要來源，其次，北極的開放，結合新技術，創造了石油和天然氣的供應渠道的增長”
。
這個新興的新世界秩序是由Henry
Tillman經營的倫敦的投資銀行Grisons
Peak LLP及其研究機構 -
中國投資研究部 - 在周五上午用幻燈片放映中呈現。他投影在會議廳的大屏幕上稱其為“鋪設極地絲綢之路”。
極地絲綢之路是中國“一帶一路”倡議的一部分，旨在降低其貿易物流成本。蒂爾曼說，北海航線不僅比目前通過印度洋和蘇伊士運河前往亞洲的能源運輸通道短得多，而且政治風險也較小。例如，沒有像在海灣地的區霍爾木茲海峽有與伊朗緊張局勢升級的发生。
美國有雄心壯志，成為世界領先的液化天然氣出口國之一。
Tillman表示，到2024年，該國的LNG產量預計將達到1億噸，俄羅斯將達到6300萬噸，但要進入亞洲和歐洲的出口市場，可能面臨更高的開采和運輸成本。
在冰島由1996
至 2016當總統的格里姆森說，這解釋了美國在面對俄羅斯接駁到歐洲的天然氣管道的計劃，以及俄羅斯和中國在北極的活動採时取激進立場的理由。
能源部石油與天然氣副部長助理肖恩·本內特（Shawn Bennett）表示，美國並不擔心競爭。他對彭博社說，印度和其他亞洲國家對天然氣需求的增長預測是如此之高，而歐洲對供應多樣化的需求是如此緊迫，以至於幾乎沒有供過於求的風險。他說：“全球對液化天然氣的需求將不斷增長。”
美國可能會以更具體的方式進行反擊。
9月30日，美國財政部因中國涉嫌違反美國對伊朗的製裁措施，對中國遠洋運輸公司的各部門實施了製裁。此舉立即衝擊了雅瑪律專案的液化天然氣油輪航線，因為中遠所占份額涉及其中一間主要航運公司。
但是，對於那些在北極工作了很長時間的人來說，許多地緣政治討論聽起來有些喘不過氣來。去年，俄羅斯的北海航線運載了2900萬噸貨物，預計將增至9000萬噸。蘇伊士運河運載約10億噸。
在從事海風險服務公司的DNV
GL Group工作, 而專門開發寒冷天气使用工的程船和石油鑽機的Janne
Valkonen認為，浮冰即使在撤退時也是無法預測，況且经过極地冰的運輸的可保風險可能比在溫暖的海域高得多。
Selmer AS公司的挪威律師Liv
Monica Stubholt說 “停止使用這些術語: 爭端，種族，略奪” 。他職责是在北極問題上向公司提供諮詢意見 -- “北極沒有爭奪。我的客戶面臨的最大問題是吸引投資。”
So, North Pole passage could
become another flash-point for world powers to fight for resources.
