Tonight I went through the archived seaice images for September 15 for each year from 1988 to 2008. In a handful of years or less the Northeast passage was open, the Northwest passage was only open in two of them, 07 and 08.
By open I mean ice free to the extent that a regular ship, not hardened for ice and not escorted by an ice breaker, could make the journey safely.
I will go back through the last 20 years for the date September 7 when I get the chance just to make sure I didn't miss anything significant, but given that in the last two year the passage has opened in late August and closed in early October, September 15 seemed like a reasonable date to survey.
PeakOil is You
Arctic shipping to conserve energy.
Re: Northwest passage may be new way to ship Alaskan oil
by Tanada » Fri 10 Oct 2008, 19:46:08
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Alfred Tennyson', 'W')e are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
- Tanada
- Site Admin
- Posts: 17094
- Joined: Thu 28 Apr 2005, 03:00:00
- Location: South West shore Lake Erie, OH, USA
Re: Northwest passage may be new way to ship Alaskan oil
by Tanada » Thu 16 Oct 2008, 18:38:47
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', 'L')ooking at the visible light sea ice satalite views Northwest Passage & Northeast Passage for Sunday October 5th it is clear that both passages are still nominally navigable by commercial shipping.
According to NSIDC 25Aug2008 $this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he United States National Ice Center confirms that Amundsen's Northwest Passage is navigable. The AMSR-E data furthermore indicate that the Northern Sea Route (also called the Northeast Passage) is open.
According to NSIDC 25Aug2008 $this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he United States National Ice Center confirms that Amundsen's Northwest Passage is navigable. The AMSR-E data furthermore indicate that the Northern Sea Route (also called the Northeast Passage) is open.
This means that the passages have both been navigable for 41 days as of yesterday. In 2007 only the Northwest passage opened, that occured 21AUG2007. The NSIDC report for 14OCT2007 indicates that no ice free route remained open as of that date. Therefore in 2007 the Northwest passage alone opened and was open about 50 days. In 2008 BOTH passages opened and are still both navigable after 41 days. I will keep an eye on them and see when each closes for the year.
For the last two years the Northwest Passage has been open for at least the last week of August, all of September and the first week of October.
Based on visible light imagry it appears that the Northeast passage closed yesterday, October 8th. From August 25th to October 7th is 43 days unless I miscounted somewhere, which is six full weeks and a day. The southern branch of thre Northwest passage remains open as of that date (yesterday).
The Northwest passage is now closed so I went back and reviewed the visible light sat images and I am confident that any standard ships could have used the North East passage from August 25 to October 6, 2008, and the North West passage from August 25 to October 11, 2008. After those dates an ice hardened ship could still make it through for a few days, but to be for my purposes when a regular freighter won't risk it for fear of damage the passage is closed. 31-25=6+30+6=42 days for the North East passage and 6+30+11=47 days for the North West passage. That is six weeks of arctic passage availibillity in 2008. That isn't quite as long as the 2007 period, but it certainly is long enough to be worth exploiting.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Alfred Tennyson', 'W')e are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
- Tanada
- Site Admin
- Posts: 17094
- Joined: Thu 28 Apr 2005, 03:00:00
- Location: South West shore Lake Erie, OH, USA
Silly? Speculate? Oh why not .The admission is free. 
I would encourage it ASAP simply because I believe the energy savings will more than make up for the direct environmental impact in terms of total environmental damage.
