Northern Passage

Extracted Attributes

• Type

  Sea lane, Shipping route

• Connects

  Atlantic Ocean and Pacific Ocean

• Location

  Arctic Ocean, Canadian Arctic Archipelago

• Piracy Risk

  Much reduced compared to Indian Ocean/Suez Canal

• Navigability

  More navigable due to Arctic sea ice decline

• Alternative Names

  Northwest Passage (NWP), Northwestern Passages, Canadian Internal Waters, Northern Sea Route (NSR), Northeast Passage (NEP)

• Length (NSR vs Suez Canal)

  13,000 kilometres (NSR) compared to 21,000 kilometres (Suez Canal route), approximately one-third of the distance

• Sovereignty Claim (Canada)

  Internal waters

• Depth (parts of eastern end)

  Barely 15 metres (49 ft)

• Length (NWP vs Panama Canal)

  7,000 km shorter than the Panama Canal route

• Sovereignty Claim (United States)

  International strait and transit passage

• Economic Benefit (NSR fuel savings)

  Up to $180,000 compared to Suez Canal

Timeline

• European explorers, beginning with Christopher Columbus, sought a navigable passage to Asia. (Source: Wikipedia)

  1492-XX-XX

• Irish explorer Robert McClure discovered an ice-bound northern route. (Source: Summary, Wikipedia)

  1850-XX-XX

• Norwegian Roald Amundsen began the first complete passage entirely by ship. (Source: Summary, Wikipedia)

  1903-XX-XX

• Norwegian Roald Amundsen completed the first complete passage entirely by ship. (Source: Summary, Wikipedia)

  1906-XX-XX

• Until this year, Arctic pack ice prevented regular marine shipping throughout most of the year. The Beluga group of Bremen, Germany, sent the first Western commercial vessels through the Northern Sea Route (Northeast Passage). (Source: Wikipedia, Web Search)

  2009-XX-XX

• The cargo ship Nordic Orion successfully navigated the Northwest Passage. (Source: Summary, Wikipedia)

  2013-09-XX

• Denmark-based shipping firm, A.P. Moller-Maersk, sent its first container ship along the Northeast Passage. (Source: Web Search)

  2018-08-XX

• The Northern Passage became navigable without entering the sea ice zone and remained open for 88 days, the longest-ever recorded. (Source: Web Search)

  2021-08-02

• Projected year for the Northern Sea Route to be ice-free. (Source: Web Search)

  2030-XX-XX

• Projected year for large-scale trans-Arctic shipping to become economically viable. (Source: Web Search)

  2040-XX-XX

Northwest Passage

The Northwest Passage (NWP) is the sea lane between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans through the Arctic Ocean, near the northern coast of North America via waterways through the Arctic Archipelago of Canada. The eastern route along the Arctic coasts of Norway and Siberia is accordingly called the Northeast Passage (NEP). The various islands of the archipelago are separated from one another and from mainland Canada by a series of Arctic waterways collectively known as the Northwest Passages, Northwestern Passages or the Canadian Internal Waters. For centuries, European explorers, beginning with Christopher Columbus in 1492, sought a navigable passage as a possible trade route to Asia, but were blocked by North, Central, and South America; by ice, or by rough waters (e.g. Tierra del Fuego). An ice-bound northern route was discovered in 1850 by the Irish explorer Robert McClure, whose expedition completed the passage by hauling sledges. Scotsman John Rae explored a more southerly area in 1854 through which Norwegian Roald Amundsen made the first complete passage entirely by ship in 1903–1906. Until 2009, the Arctic pack ice prevented regular marine shipping throughout most of the year. Arctic sea ice decline, linked primarily to climate change, has rendered the waterways more navigable for ice navigation. The contested sovereignty claims over the waters may complicate future shipping through the region: the Canadian government maintains that the Northwestern Passages are part of Canadian Internal Waters, but the United States claims that they are an international strait and transit passage, allowing free and unencumbered passage. If, as the head of a Canadian mining company claims, parts of the eastern end of the Passage are barely 15 metres (49 ft) deep, the route's viability as a Euro-Asian shipping route is reduced. In 2016, Chinese shipping line COSCO expressed a desire to make regular voyages of cargo ships using the passage to the eastern United States and Europe, after a successful passage by Nordic Orion of 73,500 tonnes deadweight tonnage in September 2013. Fully laden, Nordic Orion sat too deep in the water to sail through the Panama Canal.

Web Search Results

• The Northern Sea route: A gamechanger or a road to hegemony?

  The Northern Sea Route (NSR), or the Northeast Passage (NEP), connects the eastern and western parts of the Arctic Ocean. While the Suez Canal route (depicted in blue in the image below) between Europe and Asia has a distance of 21,000 kilometres, the NSR (in red) has a distance of 13,000 kilometres, reducing the to and fro sailing time from one month to less than two weeks between Europe and Asia. Source: Nikkei Infographics [...] With global warming becoming more severe, the NSR could emerge as a cost- and time-effective alternative to the Suez Canal. According to Weathernews, the northern passage became navigable without entering the sea ice zone on 2 August 2021 and remained open for 88 days, the longest-ever recorded. Russia has also been building icebreaker ships filled with cargo to cut through the icy obstacles and avoid fatal collisions. Problems with the existing route [...] The NSR is equally crucial for Japan and South Korea as it is for China and Russia. Both countries are the leading industrial nations of the East, increasingly using the northeastern passage. Despite the scepticism of Western shipping companies, Denmark-based shipping firm, A.P. Moller-Maersk, sent its first container ship along the passage in August 2018.

• Northwest and Northeast Passages? - Discovering the Arctic

  The Northeast Passage runs along the Arctic coast of Russia between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and is considered to be under Russian ownership. The Russians have been using the route for decades, with the help of icebreaker ships. It has until recently been closed to foreign ships, but now the Russians want to open it up and are hoping that it will eventually compete with the Suez Canal as one of the most popular shipping routes. This is mainly for economic reasons; they can charge [...] The Managing Director of one shipping company, Nordic Bulk Carriers, has estimated that using the Northeast Passage instead of the Suez Canal would save up to $180,000 in fuel costs. There are also much reduced level of of piracy through these northen routes, compared to the risk of piracy for for ships in the Indian Ocean that are using the Suez Canal. ### Why aren’t they used all the time, then? [...] ### Why are they so important? The main reason that the Northwest and Northeast Passages are so important is for shipping. The Northwest Passage route is 7,000 km shorter than the current route through the Panama Canal, and the Northeast Passage route is one-third of the distance of the traditional route through the Suez Canal. Shorter distances mean less travel time, lower fuel consumption and costs.

• Northwest Passage - Wikipedia

  | Discovery of Northern Passage Act 1776 | | | --- | --- | | Act of Parliament | | | Parliament of Great Britain | | | Long title | An Act for giving a publick Reward unto such Person or Persons, being His Majesty's Subject or Subjects, as shall discover a Northern Passage for Vessels by Sea, between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans; and also unto such as shall first approach, by Sea, within One Degree of the Northern Pole. | | Citation | 16 Geo. 3. c. 6 | | Dates | | [...] The Beluga group of Bremen, Germany, sent the first Western commercial vessels through the Northern Sea Route (Northeast Passage) in 2009. Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced that "ships entering the North-West passage should first report to his government". [...] England called the hypothetical northern route the "Northwest Passage". The desire to establish such a route motivated much of the European exploration of both coasts of North America, also known as the New World. When it became apparent that there was no route through the heart of the continent, attention turned to the possibility of a passage through northern waters. There was a lack of scientific knowledge about conditions; for instance, some people believed that seawater was incapable of

• Northern Sea Route - Wikipedia

  The entire route lies in Arctic waters and within Russia's exclusive economic zone (EEZ), and is included in what has been called the Northeast Passage, analogous to Canada's Northwest Passage. The Northern Sea Route itself does not include the Barents Sea, and it therefore does not reach the Atlantic. [...] The Dutch Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis projected in 2015 that the Northern Sea Route may be ice-free by 2030, earlier than the Northwest Passage or Transpolar Sea Route. A 2016 report by the Copenhagen Business School found that large-scale trans-Arctic shipping may become economically viable by 2040. [...] Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia ## Contents # Northern Sea Route The Northern Sea Route (NSR) (Russian: Се́верный морско́й путь, romanized: Severnyy morskoy put, shortened to Севморпуть, Sevmorput) is a shipping route about 5,600 kilometres (3,500 mi) long. The Northern Sea Route (NSR) is the shortest shipping route between the western part of Eurasia and the Asia-Pacific region.

• Northwest Passage - Arctic Portal

  The Passage represents a potentially attractive and valuable commercial shipping route if it were to become more accessible for navigation at a longer period of the year. In reality, it is a series of passages through straits of the Arctic Archipelago. It allows shipping from the North Atlantic Ocean, up Davis Strait between Canada and Greenland. The passage then continues through the Arctic Archipelago, to the Beaufort Sea over to Chukchi Sea and the Bering Strait into the North Pacific. [...] Currently, the Northwest Passage is being the shortest and most direct way for United States´ eastern regions to ship to Alaska. Both states decided to give them control over the Northwest Passage to monitor the route and ensure compliance with international legal standards for security and freedom of navigation. ### Strategic Importance and Development Potential [...] ### The Global Outlook Nowadays the Northwest Passage is seen as a revolutionary opening for large scale transportation by ships from the North Pacific to the North Atlantic Ocean. Despite the dispute between United States and Canada, Northwest Passage is seen as a global issue to affect trans-Arctic shipping operations of many countries. It is predicted that in near future, it will provide an impetus for international commercial usage. ### Visualizing the Future

• Instance Of

  Q4167410