As you shovel your driveway or scrape the ice off your windshield this winter, take a moment to think about ice breakers.
Ignore the hype about “ice free” arctic at some undetermined point in the future, Mother Nature reminded Russia early this month she has her own schedule;
District authorities in the Russian Far East have decided to commission two icebreakers to aid the vessels currently ice-locked in the East Siberian Sea.
The nuclear-powered Yamal is due to arrive in the region by 20th of November, while the diesel-powered Novorossiisk will arrive by 15th of November, regional authorities in Chukotka inform.
About the same time, my newsfeed reminded me of the rather sad state of American’s fleet of icebreakers;
The operational U.S. polar icebreaking fleet currently consists of one heavy polar icebreaker, Polar Star, and one medium polar icebreaker, Healy. In addition to Polar Star, the Coast Guard has a second heavy polar icebreaker, Polar Sea. Polar Sea, however, suffered an engine casualty in June 2010 and has been nonoperational since then. Polar Star and Polar Sea entered service in 1976 and 1978, respectively, and are now well beyond their originally intended 30-year service lives. The Coast Guard plans to extend the service life of Polar Star until the delivery of at least the second PSC. The Coast Guard is using Polar Sea as a source of spare parts for keeping Polar Star operational.
USNIBlog readers don’t need to be reminded of the importance of the Arctic to the USA and her NATO allies. Heck, just look at gas prices if you need a reminder.
There is a plan forward – if we can keep the funding going;
The Coast Guard Polar Security Cutter (PSC) program is a program to acquire three new PSCs (i.e., heavy polar icebreakers), to be followed years from now by the acquisition of up to three new Arctic Security Cutters (ASCs) (i.e., medium polar icebreakers). The PSC program has received a total of $1,754.6 million (i.e., about $1.8 billion) in procurement funding through FY2021, including $300 million that was provided through the Navy’s shipbuilding account in FY2017 and FY2018. With the funding the program has received through FY2021, the first two PSCs are now fully funded.
…
On April 23, 2019, the Coast Guard-Navy Integrated Program Office for the PSC program awarded a $745.9 million fixed-price, incentive-firm contract for the detail design and construction (DD&C) of the first PSC to VT Halter Marine of Pascagoula, MS, a shipyard owned by Singapore Technologies (ST) Engineering. VT Halter was the leader of one of three industry teams that competed for the DD&C contract. The first PSC is scheduled to begin construction in 2021 and be delivered in 2024, though the DD&C contract includes financial incentives for earlier delivery.The DD&C contract includes options for building the second and third PSCs. If these options are exercised, the total value of the contract would increase to $1,942.8 million (i.e., about $1.9 billion). The figures of $745.9 million and $1,942.8 million cover only the shipbuilder’s costs; they do not include the cost of government-furnished equipment (GFE), which is equipment for the ships that the government purchases and then provides to the shipbuilder for incorporation into the ship, post-delivery costs, costs for Navy-specific equipment, or government program-management costs.
This should have been started a decade earlier, but we’ve discussed this before. Better late than never.
Oh, and that non-Arctic-not-pacing-but-advancing-power that we are either are or are not in competition with? She didn’t wait. From last year;
China’s first domestically built icebreaker left this month for its first trip to the Arctic, a few days after President Donald Trump said the US was pursuing as many as 10 new icebreakers of its own, underscoring the growing interest major powers have in being able to access the region.
Xuelong 2, or Snow Dragon 2, left Shanghai on July 15 for a scientific expedition to the Arctic and is expected to return in late September. Scientists aboard the ship plan to research Arctic biodiversity and ecosystems to improve China’s understanding of climate change in the Arctic, according to state media.
The Xuelong, which China bought in the 1990s, has already traveled to the Arctic. While Xuelong 2’s trip isn’t a first for Beijing, it adds credibility to China’s polar ambitions, according to Dr. Elizabeth Buchanan, a lecturer at Deakin University in Australia.
There is a strategic opening here, if we have the desire to take it.
Russia knows it’s reliant on China for investment in its Arctic energy projects and is pursuing other partners for that reason, Buchanan said.
“The Russia-China Arctic relationship is extremely precarious, but at least both parties recognize this. Beijing needs access to Russia’s [Northern Sea Route] to fulfill Polar Silk Road ambitions and for now will continue to play by Moscow’s rules there,” Buchanan added. “Problem is, Moscow can’t trust Beijing to continue to do so.”
More and faster.