The nuclear-powered icebreaker fleet operated by Russia’s State Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom and all other Rosatom’s projects related to the Northern Sea Route are progressing, and possibly even faster than planned, Rosatom Director General Alexey Likhachev said in a meeting with RF President Vladimir Putin.
‘We are conducting an additional analysis of icebreaker support requirements after 2024 or even 2030. We can see serious growth in all of the three areas: icebreaker escort services for our export projects (oil, gas, coal and metal); increased volume of coastal shipping, as per your instructions, namely, internal transportation in our huge country along the Northern Sea Route; and we also expect a major increase in transit volumes. The recent developments that took place in the Suez Canal and, in general, increasing global trade despite all the hurdles, call for creating alternative routes,’ the Kremlin press office quotes Likhachev as saying.
‘The international business community, the state and private businesses in various countries have indicated their interest in this. If you approve our idea, we would like to use our Northern Sea Route project as the basis for developing a major logistical container transport corridor. On the one hand, we will be able to use the available NSR infrastructure, in which we are investing both federal funds and the capital of the state corporation,’ Likhachev said.
‘On the other hand, it will be a completely new level of business, an absolutely new level of the economic presentation of the State Atomic Energy Corporation and the country as a whole. And this will also bring objective advantages to the global economy. In this sense, we are aware of the possible shortage of icebreaker escorts, which is why we have formulated the relevant proposals,’ he added.