https://sputniknews.com/world/201703261051984201-russia-arctic-us-development/

 

I’m in violent agreement with Heather Exner-Pirot, the US Arctic and Russia/Canada are completely different in terms of mass, stage of development, even hydrography. I think the US thinks of their Arctic as a forward operating post rather than an area to be developed. 

I’m not sure there’s even the interest or the suitable resources to be developed. With the departure of Shell and the drop in oil price (not unrelated) oil development is off the table for this round. The most common mineralisation on the North Slope is coal, which is neither in short supply or particularly valuable. As I recall there’s also gold, which is never shipping intensive (a friend of mine once said that each gold brick could afford it’s own airplane seat, which doesn’t help shipping much). Which is a shame, because the experience in the Canadian Arctic is that while all the razmatazz is about oil and gas (every 40 years or so) what actually develops shipping in the Arctic are mines.

Then again if the US president decides that there has been a war on Arctic coal he can declare the economics viable.