Canadians Plan Robot Sub Missions To Aid Claim For Arctic

jbpisio writes with a link to this blog-post summary that the Canadian government has commissioned a pair of unmanned subs to explore the geology of two underwater Arctic mountain ranges; the subs' mission will be to provide evidence supporting Canada's claim to huge swaths of potentially petroleum-rich seabed areas. According to the linked article, "The submersibles, scheduled to be launched in 2010, would be sent on a series of 400-kilometer missions north and west of Ellesmere Island, Canada's northernmost land mass and the country's gateway to the open Arctic Ocean — the scene of an international power struggle over undersea territory and petroleum resources believed to be worth trillions of dollars." At least five countries (besides Canada, these are the US, Russia, Denmark and Norway) would like a slice of those trillions.

Comments

The mountie always gets his man

[LiquidCoooled]

The mountie always gets his man errrrr killer whale.

Is it worth it?

[discards]

I wonder, with the economic crisis and the cost of fuel going down, will the race to claim and exploit Arctic fuel go ahead. The fuel there is ridiculously expensive to get to, so without oil being $100+ per barrel, will any of these countries really bother?

Re:Is it worth it?

[epiteo]

The idea is that once the ice has melted it will be cheaper to get to the fuel/resources there.

Re:Is it worth it?

[Paradise Pete]

I wonder, with the economic crisis and the cost of fuel going down, will the race to claim and exploit Arctic fuel go ahead.

Sooner or later it will be worth it, and so it makes sense to stake the claims now.

Re:Is it worth it?

[Anonymous Coward]

The area in question is VERY unlikely to be explored for petroleum, let alone developed, for decades. And there may be nothing there.

The real issue is the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, which allows countries to claim exclusive mineral rights beyond the current 200 nautical mile limit, out to the edge of the continental margin (which the treaty calls the "continental shelf", but it's not the same as the usual definition of that term). In some places this can be a significant chunk of territory. However, to establish the claim you have to define the geological boundary between continental crust and ocean crust, and there is a limited time to do so after ratification of the treaty (10 years). In Canada's case, the treaty was ratified in 2003. Canada therefore has to submit the claim to the responsible UN commission by 2013. In the part of the Arctic Ocean that is close to Canada, there is a large area (e.g., the Alpha Ridge) that is shallow enough that it could be claimed (the white line in the picture in the above link), if it is shown to be continental material. Unfortunately there isn't much known about that area, because the Arctic Ocean is one of the least-understood ocean basins. Hence there is a strong motivation to find out more about it, and sooner than 2013. With sea ice covering most of the area most of the year, it makes sense to use subs to survey it.

It isn't so much a "power struggle" as a 10-year window to define a geological boundary in order to make an exclusive claim in the area, under international law. After that, the 200 nautical mile limit becomes the permanent boundary. Russia, Denmark (Greenland), and Norway have ratified the treaty, so they're in the running with Canada. The U.S. isn't, because it hasn't ratified, but it doesn't have much to gain in the Arctic (the continental margin in Alaska is narrow). As a sign that it isn't really much of a "power struggle", Canada, Russia, and Denmark have all run joint scientific expeditions to the area to study the sea floor geology in the last several years.

Re:Is it worth it?

[dontmakemethink]

Great, so all we have to do is burn off all other oil sources to heat the planet up enough to melt the ice cap to get more oil.

What most don't realize is that the polar ice caps play a major role in moderating the Earth's temperature. Ice reflects light, while water (or at least its contents) absorbs it. Without the ice caps, the sunlight is absorbed into the water, raising the temperature of the oceans globally, compounding the global warming issues we're already facing.

Trust me, if that happens, the last thing we'll be worried about is finding more oil. The average year would make the last El Nino year seem like scattered showers with mild gusts.

The North Pole has become an island for the first time in human history. "Shipping companies are already planning to exploit the first simultaneous opening of the routes since the beginning of the last Ice Age 125,000 years ago. The Beluga Group in Germany says it will send the first ship through the north-east passage, around Russia, next year, cutting 4,000 miles off the voyage from Germany to Japan."

Cold (Brrrrr!) War?

[Smivs]

So everyone is sending midget subs to the arctic in an attempt to gain some sort of rights to exploit the resources there. Is it only a matter of time before they start equiping them with torpedoes and try to sink each other? Last sub floating wins...like underwater robot wars.
Actually, now I think about it, no-one will get hurt and this is starting to sound like fun!

Re:Cold (Brrrrr!) War?

[supernova_hq]

Last sub floating wins...

*scratches head...*

Cold war in the making

[bazorg]

If the ice melts and access to these areas becomes easier, I imagine there will be a major stand-off between the Navy forces of the major countries involved in this dispute and nobody will have the means to build any oil rig.

I hope that by then there will be a practical way to use hydrogen or something else instead of oil.

Re:Cold war in the making

[florescent_beige]

Canada doesn't have a major navy. There have been plans in the past to at least buy a polar-class ice breaker to patrol the north but that keeps getting canceled. Maybe it's back on (named, ironically enough, after Diefenbaker, he who murdered the Arrow. Harper has such a low opinion of Canadians he doesn't think we'll remember. Him and McKay, minister in charge of using his position to pick up chicks and lying through his pointy little teeth to the Progressive Conservatives, God Rest Their Souls.

Chances are, though, Harper is lying again.

At any rate, the Conservatives can be counted on to tool around with idiotic hardware to prove that Alberta is just as good as Texas. "Can we be Texas, please? Pleeeeeease?"

Re:Cold war in the making

[fermion]

The updated UN Law of the Sea is supposed to prevent random claims and standoffs. Under the treaty very little of the artic is unassigned and there is a protocol for dealing with over lapping claims. About the only major country that has not signed(as far as I know) is the us. The complaint was basically that it gave too much land to the russians, which is hard to avoid as they have a great deal of land in the Arctic, and that the dispute resolution protocol. If we do not sign it, we end up losing a lot of potential territory though, and potential energy deposits. Fortunately after years of obstruction, Bush caved in last summer and the new democratic congress ratified it.

As far as building oil rigs, I doubt any one is going to make any money off it while oil is under $100 a barrel, unless, of course, governments pays for the projects outright with little hope of return. About the only country with that kind of cash and that kind of political system is Russia. The US, or course, is broke, and the US oil companies are clearly not interested in difficult projects, as they hardly explore the oil fields they have. In any case the future is renewable energy, and investing in oil is throwing good money after bad, as is shown with multitrillions of dollars thrown away in Iraq while Afghanistan is left to harbor enemies.

Re:Cold war in the making

[bazorg]

I don't mean to offend anyone Canadian, but when I wrote about the major Navy forces in the region I was thinking of USA and Russia. Maybe China too if this story goes on for a long time and they become the owners of Eastern Russia.

As for UN-sanctioned borders and conflict mediation, if there is enough oil for this to become a conflict, I suspect the UN will not be able to cope.

Only a matter of time

[hyades1]

All that oil and only a few bears, seals and Inuit to complain. It looks like sooner, rather than later, we'll hear Mother Nature squealing "Oh my God! Nobody's ever put it THERE before!"

Re:Only a matter of time

[molarmass192]

A couple of corrections, the population of Alert is closer to 200, and the nearest city (Iqaluit) is about 1300 miles away. That said, Iqaluit has a pop of about 7000, so town might be a better term. However, that land does fall under the Nunavut territory, so the riches really are theirs to control.

Re:Not content to stop

[Roland Piquepaille]

I understand your bitterness over countries fighting to take control of an ever-shrinking reserve of energy that has no future and damages the environment, but consider this also :

Successful nuclear fusion reactors (that put out more energy that they consume), at the current rate of scientific research, will appear in the 2040's at the earliest. In the meantime, fossil fuel prices are going to go up and up, and millions with low incomes are going to find it hard to heat their homes, buy food and travel to work. Do you really want them to struggle to survive until the magic energy bullet is found?

This said, I agree that now would be the time to form international consortiums to manage whatever is left of oil reserves worldwide intelligently (fat chance, too much money involved of course) and diverts the money spent in pointless wars over said oil to research, so the aforementioned magic bullet might be found earlier.

The USA is sending Sarah Palin...

[tjstork]

We're sending her up there, and she'll just claim the whole lot using her sense of geography and nationalism to claim the whole lot. She becomes a national hero to a nation more interested in oil than logic, and she'll be swept into the oval office in 2012, reminding voters that she takes those nucular codes very serious.

Re:The USA is sending Sarah Palin...

[couchslug]

"We're sending her up there, and she'll just claim the whole lot using her sense of geography and nationalism to claim the whole lot. She becomes a national hero to a nation more interested in oil than logic, and she'll be swept into the oval office in 2012, reminding voters that she takes those nucular codes very serious."

Only the harsh, jackbooted Discipline of Alaska Barbie can rescue us from the Putinist Threat and restore the US to comforting post-WWII smalltown niceness. Vote for the She-Wolf of Mayberry!

Make up your mind

[bartyboy]

You rag on John Diefenbaker (Progressive Conservative) for cancelling a very expensive program and you whine that Stephen Harper (Conservative) is not spending enough on exploring the arctic.

You're either a troll or a disgruntled liberal will find any excuse to bash the conservatives. Frankly, I don't know how you got moderated up.

Re:Make up your mind

[florescent_beige]

You rag on John Diefenbaker (Progressive Conservative) for cancelling a very expensive program and you whine that Stephen Harper (Conservative) is not spending enough on exploring the arctic.

You're either a troll or a disgruntled liberal will find any excuse to bash the conservatives. Frankly, I don't know how you got moderated up.

There's a difference between liberal and Liberal, which one did you mean? Are you another Canadian who takes his lessons on political discourse from from American talk radio and don't know the difference?

Diefenbaker toadied up to Eisenhower and destroyed the Canadian aerospace industry, airframe and engine at the behest of the Americans who didn't want the competition. (Ironically ever since then Americans have ragged on Canada for not pulling our weight, which makes me choke).

Harper is either lying or delusional about the cost of icebreakers.

What exactly is your problem with these statements? Factually incorrect or just inconvenient for those Canadians who would rather be Americans?

So, all it takes is planting the flag eh?

[hey!]

This could get very ugly.

The law of the sea supposedly governs this kind of thing. Determining the extent of the continental shelf can extend the exclusive national right for minerals up to 150 nm past the EEZ, so in theory the documentation of the shelf should be a benign action. But ultimately international law is enforced by warfare on various scales of intensity, starting at diplomatic sanctions, through economic sanctions, and all the way up as high as warfare can go.

International law is only what you can force a country to accept as international law. We know Russia wants to claim these resources, and gainsaying them can lead to armed conflict.

Back in 1991, I remarked that the course of the twenty first century would be determined by the integration of the former Soviet states into the world political, security and economic systems. The opportunity to do this, if it ever existed, was bungled by the first Bush administration, and now we are dealing with a militarily powerful, mineral rich nation with a paranoid persecution complex and authoritarian instincts. Do they have more invested in stability than they can get out of grabbing territory?

Re:So, all it takes is planting the flag eh?

[iminplaya]

...now we are dealing with a militarily powerful, mineral rich nation with a paranoid persecution complex and authoritarian instincts.

Who? Russia, or the USA?

Re:Yeah I just had to do it

[ColdWetDog]

At risk of sounding like a naive hippy, can't we all just get along?

No.

What the fuck is wrong with humans that we can't see that its in *everybody's* best interest to not act like a bunch of 5 year olds in a playpen?

Three quotes from people way smarter than me:

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.(George Santayana) "

"Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so." - Douglas Adams

and finally from St. Heinlein:

"Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst. " Starship troopers, 1959

Pure Fucking Insanity

[Conspicuous Coward]

Two articles, 50 posts, and nary a mention of the total gibbering insanity of this move.

Our species is burning oil at such a rate that it's actually causing the polar ice caps to melt. Instead of turning around and thinking about just what the hell we're doing to ourselves we actually use this as an excuse to start a competition for oil rights under the ice that we're about to melt. Just take a step back and think about that for a minute, the lunacy of it just absolutely blows my mind.

This is like a crack addict scraping the dead tissue out of their lungs and putting that shit back into their pipe and smoking it. Doesn't there come a point at which people think our energy consumption might be costing us too fucking much and we need to just cut down a tad? Seriously, if this talk about drilling for oil in the Arctic isn't meant as a joke then satire is dead, and our species is headed the same way.

</rant>

Re:Pure Fucking Insanity

[Jerry Rivers]

This is as much about protecting sovereignty as it is about oil, of which Canada already has the second largest reserve in the world. It doesn't really need any more, but it does need to protect itself from the expansionist greed of other nations.

But I do agree about the utter insanity of burning fossil fuels.

Re:Yeah I just had to do it

[gwait]

The owners of the robots become wealthy and hold the power, not the robots themselves.

We're an extremely long way from any sign of actual machine intelligence, and only a complete moron would give such a machine power. Uh oh...

Ok, we're an extremely long way from machine intelligence...