Arctic booms as climate change melts polar ice cap

The 14 million sq km Arctic Ocean is home to 25 per cent of the planet’s unextracted oil and natural gas. With a population of four million, the region is much more stable than the Middle East. Global warming, in combination with the current high oil price, makes it ever more accessible. Yet the bordering countries – Russia, Canada, the US, Norway and Danish Greenland – have yet to agree on who owns what.

Immediately to the east of the area, the Russians have discovered the 1,400sq km Shtokman field, the largest offshore gas deposit in the world.

The project will come on stream in 2007 to deliver 2.4 billion cubic metres of liquefied natural gas to the US and Spain among others.

guardian