A comparative study of the northern sea route (NSR) in commercial and environmental perspective with focus on LNG shipping

• Zeeshan Raza ^[1] ; Halvor Schøyen ^[1]
  1. [1] Vestfold University College

     Vestfold University College

     Noruega

     
• Localización: Maritime Transport'14 / coord. por Francisco Javier Martínez de Osés, Marcella Castells Sanabra, 2014, ISBN 978-84-9880-483-6, págs. 549-576
• Idioma: inglés
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  • Texto Completo Libro
• Resumen

  • Thawing sea ice in the arctic due to global warming has opened up new horizons for an environment friendly and cost efficient trade route between Europe and Asia. This study investigates the economic and environmental potential of Northern Sea Route over the Suez Canal for the transit shipping of LNG. As an alternate to the Suez Canal, the Northern Sea Route (NSR) offers 50% shorter sailing distance between Northwestern Europe (Hammerfest, Norway) and Northeast Asia (Tobata, Japan). The shorter distance via the Northern Sea Route comparatively accelerates the route’s cost efficiency by 42% and leads to curb the carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by 52%. In comparison to the traditional route of Suez Canal, cost savings by using the (NSR) could be as large as about 4.7 million US dollars from a full round voyage between the certain ports. This may attract the maritime actors to make the concerning required investments. Global product price differences and variations in the energy market may affect the prospective use of Northern Sea Route. In present, the lack of icebreakers and a scanty fleet of standardized ice-classed vessels may delay the early transit operations across the NSR. The contribution of this paper is a comparison of transport cost components and CO2 emissions, for the full round voyage of an LNG carrier traversing the Northern Sea Route and the Suez Canal between Europe and Asia. The total savings made in respect of cost and CO2 emissions by using the Northern Sea Route are derived, by citing to the most recent interviews of arctic shipping experts and existing literature. A sensitivity analysis is conducted to assess the impact of key cost components on the overall shipping cost picture. The main research questions are: How much is the economic potential of using the Northern Sea Route as an alternate to the Suez Canal for LNG transportation between Europe and Asia? How does the NSR assist to gain the environmental sustainability in terms of CO2 emissions?