Problems of the Development of Mineral Resources with Year-Round Transportation of the Products from the Water Area of the Northern Sea Route


Annotation:

Today, one of the key tasks of the state policy is the development of the Arctic zone of the Russian Federation, and the development of the Northern Sea Route. The drivers of the economic growth of the territory are the projects for the development of mineral resources with ensuring environmental and industrial safety. Some projects are implemented in the areas remote from the systems of the main pipelines and railways, which determines the optimal transportation of products by sea. The flow of minerals will be governing for the development of Arctic shipping.

In the water area of the Northern Sea Route, it is currently planned to implement 14 projects for the development of mineral resources and the transportation of product of oil and gas and mining complexes, nine of which require year-round export. Also, an indispensable condition is ensuring safety of navigation in the water area the Northern Sea Route. Therefore, the required condition for organizing year-round safe navigation in the water area of the Northern Sea Route is an availability of the sufficient number of icebreakers.

The projects of the development of mineral resources with the export of the products through the water area of the Northern Sea Route are considered; modeling of logistic schemes of products transportation is given. The prospects are analyzed concerning the development of the linear Arctic icebreaker fleet in Russia, the icebreaker support of mineral extraction projects with year-round products transportation is assessed. There is a high level of probability that the projects for the development of mineral resources in the Gulf of Ob, on the river of Yenisei and the Yenisei Gulf may be insufficiently supported by the icebreakers. Ways are proposed related to solving the expected problem, in particular, the construction of non-nuclear icebreakers at the expense of the mining companies.

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DOI: 10.24000/0409-2961-2020-1-42-51
Year: 2020
Issue num: January
Keywords : safety Northern Sea Route development projects mineral resources logistic schemes icebreaker
Authors:
  • Grigoryev M.N.
    Cand. Sci. (Geol.-Mineral.), Lead Researcher, mgrigoriev@gecon.ru The Institute of World Economy and International Relations of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IMEMO), Moscow, Russia