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Rosatom: Northern Sea Route needs 14 icebreakers by 2030

According to Rosatom’s Deputy Director General Vyacheslav Ruksha, presently, the shipbuilding sector cannot meet the demand to satisfy the Northern Sea Route’s regular shipments

ST. PETERSBURG, December 2. /TASS/. In order to assure smooth work of the Northern Sea Route Russia must have there 12-14 working icebreakers by 2030, head of the Northern Sea Route’s management, Rosatom’s Deputy Director General Vyacheslav Ruksha said at the 11th international forum Arctic: Present and Future.

"I would like to reiterate why we need such shipbuilding rates," he said. "That is because out of the four working icebreakers three - namely, the Taimyr, the Vaygach and the Yamal - will anyway soon stop working due to their age - about 32-35 years."

"Thus, by 2030 we will have at least 7 nuclear-powered icebreakers, while the demand is 12-14 icebreakers," he told the forum’s plenary session.

According to him, presently, the shipbuilding sector cannot meet the demand to satisfy the Northern Sea Route’s regular shipments. It takes about two-three years to build one nuclear-powered icebreaker, he stressed.

One of the solutions could be to build icebreakers, powered by liquefied natural gas (LNG). A promising project, he continued, is the Aker ARC 123 model, designed jointly with a Finnish engineering company. The icebreaker, using LNG or diesel, has the power of 55 MW.

The 11th international forum Arctic: Present and Future will continue working in St. Petersburg to December 4. The program, which includes 52 discussion sites, two plenary sessions, and roundtables, will focus on the Arctic ecology, development of infrastructure shipments along the Northern Sea Route, and other topics. TASS is the event’s general information partner.