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With the Arctic turning into the next shipping route, Iceland could turn to be the Singapore of the North Atlantic, a trading hub. I mentioned this to an Icelan
by netsharc 2y ago
With the Arctic turning into the next shipping route, Iceland could turn to be the Singapore of the North Atlantic, a trading hub. I mentioned this to an Icelander a few months ago, and he said China recently asked if they could build a port in the north of the country...
- ksec 2y ago>Arctic turning into the next shipping route I always wonder how realistic is this? I assume we dont need special vessel for this shipping lane and we can somehow always clear all the ice before us.
- throw0101d 2y ago> I assume we dont need special vessel for this shipping lane and we can somehow always clear all the ice before us. With climate change there are longer and longer times of the year when there is no ice. And when it does reform it is often not as thick as before, so less robust ships may be needed.
- netsharc 2y agoWe've been adjusting the temperature there so ice won't be a problem soon...
- GoldenMonkey 2y agoAnd yet, there is 26% more extent area with ice than in 2012. https://x.com/TonyClimate/status/1872304912115408920 https://x.com/TonyClimate/status/1872304912115408920
- lostlogin 2y agoCherry picking a data point is misleading. Rather than compare a record low year, why not look at a trend? https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/climate-change-indicators-arctic-sea-ice https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/climate-change-indica...
- insane_dreamer 2y agoI can take any two data points to prove any point I want. That's not how statistics work. The Arctic is expected to be ice free by 2027. That is what matters when it comes to shipping. https://www.euronews.com/green/2024/12/04/an-ice-free-arctic-could-happen-by-summer-2027-what-it-means-for-weather-shipping-and-pola https://www.euronews.com/green/2024/12/04/an-ice-free-arctic...
- arandomusername 2y agoNo it's not. Literally from the study that the article was based on: > the earliest ice-free conditions (the first single occurrence of an ice-free Arctic) *could* occur in 2020–2030s under all emission trajectories and are *likely* to occur by 2050
- bryanlarsen 2y agoWhat value does a hub add in this day and age? I imagine most ships would sail direct rather than stopping at a hub.
- cyberpunk 2y agoIsn't it cheaper to refuel than to have to lug enough fuel around purely by the weight of it and the additional energy required? Plus your crew may need some downtime sometimes.
- bobthepanda 2y agoNo, because ports have docking fees since port space is at a premium.
- cyberpunk 2y agoI find it hard to believe the cost of docking for a few hours to refuel is > the cost of carrying and moving 2x the weight of fuel you would need otherwise. Do you have some idea of the costs?
- ponector 2y agoHow much heavy fuel does a suezmax vessel carry? Less than 1% of the full deadweight, I assume. Costs of carrying fuel are negligible.
- bobthepanda 2y agoShips don’t use all that much fuel. A Panamax ship has a capacity of 2 million gallons of fuel and that would be ~2,600 tons. The total tonnage of a Panamax ship is ~52,000 tons. Most cargo shipping saves fuel by just running slower.
- no_wizard 2y agoThis makes me wonder if the Navy nuclear reactors used on their ships could be used on shipping vessels to lower the cost of shipping in some manner. Perhaps a sky high dream but wouldn’t this effectively given ships unlimited fuel?
- jessekv 2y agoSingapore is also an island, but its relevance to global trade has more to do with the strait it sits in than in being an island. Obviously there are more factors, compare Singapore to Peneng, for example.
- bboygravity 2y agoThere are a couple 100 or so more Islands all around Singapore. Your comment doesn't say much.
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- bobthepanda 2y agoI think that only proves the point that Singapore is very much an exception and there isn’t any particular need for ships to stop at islands on their way.
- teractiveodular 2y agoNo, there absolutely is a huge demand for transshipment hubs. By shuttling cargo through Singapore, goods from all across Asia can be consolidated in one point for delivery to various European locations, and vice versa. It's the same model as airport hubs. However, like many network efforts it's a winner-takes-almost-all market. Tanjung Pelepas is just across the border in Malaysia but it was too little, too late.
- bobthepanda 2y agoSure, but transhipment hubs don’t have to be islands. In fact they usually aren’t. Hawaii isn’t and it’s the only landmass for thousands of miles. Anchorage isn’t for seaborne traffic. Etc. A lot of Singapore’s thing is also manufacturing from raw imports and then shipping out processed goods.
- 2y ago
- behnamoh 2y agoThat's exactly why Trump wants to annex Greenland. I'm not taking sides here, but I see why world powers want to control that region, knowing that Russia probably will make incursions in that region—they already control the Arctic to some extent as if it's part of their territory...
- epolanski 2y agoOn which legal basis does he want to annex it? It belongs to the few thousands people that live there and want to be part of Denmark and Europe. There's really no claim to Greenland other than "it's close".
- chgs 2y agoLarge swathes of the US think that “I want that” is an acceptable reason to take some land.
- toast0 2y agoCash for land is a valid basis for annexation if you have a seller. Worked for Alaska and Lousiana.
- troad 2y agoAs well as the Virgin Islands, which the US bought from Denmark as recently as 1917. The population of Greenland, per Wikipedia, is 56,583. The US could offer $50,000 to each man, woman, and child in Greenland. That's just over $2.8bn, which is pocket change for the US. The domestic (Greenlandic) politics around this could shift dramatically with such an offer. Throw in a few billion for Denmark (or a promise to continue to engage in NATO, or some other core interest of Denmark's) and you've probably got a sealed deal. I'm not saying that the Greenlanders should do this, but it's not nearly as unrealistic as some people seem to think. I'd be surprised if Trump actually followed up on any of this though.
- Symbiote 2y agoDenmark already subsidizes Greenland to around $10,000 per capita every year, so I think the Greenlanders would want a much higher offer.
- mrweasel 2y agoI think you underestimate Singapore. They put a lot of effort into not being just a trading hub. Also, what's the point in loading and unloading in Iceland, when you're already fairly close to ports like Rotterdam, Antwerp and Hamburg? I get that you could in theory ship around the pole, split your containers in Iceland and ship to the US and EU from there. It's just that unloading a container ship isn't that fast, and we're already shipping so much that the load could just be distributed across multiple ships with separate destinations.
- bognition 2y agoIceland effectively has free electricity. I believe they are one of the biggest producers of refined aluminum. Could use it as a way station to process raw material that require a lot of electricity.
- ponector 2y agoFree? Half of the world has cheaper electricity than Iceland according to https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/cost-of-electricity-by-country https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/cost-of-e...
- Scoundreller 2y agoI wonder how much that cost is just amortizing delivery costs. If most of the population has district heating, there isn’t much of a load per residence.
- xhkkffbf 2y agoI'm always interested in how reality can be different from the popular notions. Sure, they have plenty of geothermal energy but it's not free to turn that heat into electricity. And many other things are pretty expensive on that island so it's not surprising that the cost of generators and other machinery is also expensive. But we can dream that it's free, right?
- 2y ago
- MrDresden 2y agoThis is nothing new. 5-7 years ago there were "plans" announced involving a German conglomerate wanting to create a giant container port in the east of the island.
- chippiewill 2y agoSeems unlikely. Freight would be heading primarily from Asia to either Europe or US East coast, and maybe a bit in the opposite direction. In either case, Europe and the US have such efficient rail/road freight that I can't see economics of putting a hub in Iceland making sense. You may as well have ships travel direct to the respective continental mainlands.
- rurban 2y agoSingapore controls the east shipping route. There is a very narrow route there, easily controllable by military, if necessary. Iceland not all. You can easily get around them. The Azores were the trading and fruit manifactoring hub there instead. They could deliver all the fruits for all of Europe. What can Iceland deliver to Europe? They are also in the center, not the north route.
- ta12653421 2y ago++1 good one! also, i was thinking about UK joining EFTA, though so far they didnt...