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World's biggest shipping firm to test Russian Arctic route
Danish shipping group A.P. Moller-Maersk said Thursday it will send a cargo vessel through the Russian Arctic for the first time as a result of melting sea ice.
[...] "I think it is important to underline that this is a one-off trial designed to explore an unknown route for container shipping and to collect scientific data—and not the launch of a new product," von Spalding said in an email to The Associated Press.
The Northern Sea Route could be a shorter route for journeys from East Asia to Europe than the Northwest Passage over Canada because it will likely be free of ice sooner due to climate change.
Experts say it could reduce the most commonly used East Asia-Europe route via the Suez Canal from 21,000 kilometers (13,000 miles) to 12,800 kilometers (8,000 miles), cutting transit time by 10-15 days.
Von Spalding said the ship will leave Russia's Pacific port city of Vladivostok around Sept. 1 with a cargo of frozen fish and sail to St. Petersburg where it will arrive by the end of the month.
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @11:14AM (5 children)
Nevermind fucking up the untouched arctic nature...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @01:07PM (2 children)
It's been frozen since the last ice age.
Nothing screw up. There's not even a fishery there.
However shaving that many miles off the trip saves an enormous amount of fuel which also reduces emissions and helps keep the overall environment healthier.
Hurray for Global Warming!
I can't wait until you can sit on a tropical beach in Alaska!
(Score: 2) by Subsentient on Friday August 24 2018, @01:18PM (1 child)
As someone from Arizona, where the summers routinely reach 120F, I'm... less thrilled.
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." -Jiddu Krishnamurti
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @02:05PM
Do what the birds do, migrate north.
In truth though, Global Warming should turn Phoenix into a lake again.
Lagoons will get deserty, but the deserts should bloom
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday August 24 2018, @01:11PM
There is not much nature in the arctic. It's snow and ice and sea water and bare rock. Also, if there had been any nature to fuck up in the arctic, then the Soviet Union had surely done it before they were through. A container ship full of frozen fish or even plastic widgets from China could hardly do worse.
Running oil tankers through the Amazon basin, now, that would fuck up nature.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @01:33PM
C’mon, you know you’ll end up paying the same or more for all the plastic shit. It’s going to make it cheaper for the vendor, the shipper, and the manufacturer. Not for the end consumer. I think we’re all familiar enough with the MBA decisions that get made to know how this all goes by now.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Subsentient on Friday August 24 2018, @01:11PM (14 children)
I'm all for finding the peanuts in the turd, but this just feels wrong. The same companies and practices that caused this calamity are profiting off the end result of nature's destruction.
There's no words to describe how disgusted I am.
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." -Jiddu Krishnamurti
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Friday August 24 2018, @01:44PM (12 children)
I agree, but it's part and parcel with everything else. Many people who decry oil companies and their destructive role in the environment want to keep driving their turbo-charged ICE cars, and do it with no sense of irony at all. Many people who worry about the Pacific Garbage Patch run right out to buy another trinket from Target instead of, gasp, fixing the one they already have, and they do it with no sense of irony at all.
I live in a progressive neighborhood in Brooklyn, and am surrounded by people who buy organic produce and insist on GMO-free items and all that sort of thing, but they look at me like I'm nuts when I talk about how I grow my own fruit and veg because, wait for it, it might have dirt on it or marring from insects. Poisonous, poisonous dirt, and the horrible harmful insects that are actually the "vanishing pollinators" they fret about.
You can't make this stuff up.
Let's do have concern for the environment, but let's practice integrity in that concern and change how we live and how we consume.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Friday August 24 2018, @01:49PM (7 children)
Yup!
Next year I should have a whole mess of asparagus now that I've kept the squirrels out.
Squishing lots of asparagus bugs, though.
Gonna grow more potatoes next year.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday August 24 2018, @02:10PM (1 child)
Trying to see how is to squish those [wikipedia.org] next?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Friday August 24 2018, @03:27PM
Asparagus bugs try to hide on you by moving to the other side away from you so I found sometimes it's best to just smack your palms together to squish them.
The 'slugs' they come from.....just squish them. Gross but effective. The Late (4th) instar stage of larva, before pupation for the potato but looks closest to the asparagus slug.
*Squish!* over and over and over....
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday August 24 2018, @07:56PM (2 children)
I've thought about growing asparagus, but everyone says they're difficult. What's your experience been?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Friday August 24 2018, @10:26PM
I bought the grown plants from a nearby market.
Plant them and PROTECT THEM (squirrels or something like to dig them up/trash them) and water them well (i have a garden box). I also sprinkled clover seeds and let them take over because they 'fix' nitrogen or somethig into the soil which the asparagus loves. Compost and good soil and they are coming up well, should be able to pick some next year and then will have an abundance the year after ('they' say to plant it and then wait a year to pick... from seeds you have to wait a further year or two).
The only problems i've had are with nature: squirrels (or ??)digging them up and the asparagus bugs: it looks like they lay eggs on the asparagus branches (as it's going to seed) and then eat the asparagus outside (the 'bark'). Then the eggs hatch into a slug like thing. Squish the beetle/bugs and the slugs CONSTANTLY.
Other than that, not really anymore problem than tomatoes or potatoes. I'd go for it if you love aparagus.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 25 2018, @11:57AM
I'm in the Midwest, and they've been super easy here. Just transplant, let it grow and go to seed for a year or two, and harvest. I haven't had any issues with pests or squirrels around here, they're probably too busy with my walnut trees to pay attention to the asparagus. I have mine planted on the edge of an otherwise decorative plot of pollinator-friendly native plants along with some garlic that had sprouted in my cupboard.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 25 2018, @01:22AM (1 child)
How???
The damn things ate 100% of my mangoes. Well, they ate 5% of each one on the tree, just before ripening.
I thought of an electric fence, but even with the power supply going for only $30 it looks like the whole setup would cost more than the mangoes are worth.
I had a kid trap a couple of them. I could have given him a crossbow to get a few more. Other than that...?
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Saturday August 25 2018, @03:21AM
All I did was put some chicken(y) type wire fencing LOOSELY around the garden box held up by the box and some metal rods. Maybe with it so loose and wobbly they couldn't climb it well??
Dunno.
Either it was squirrels or rabbits. Or...
I just remember chasing A squirrel out, but don't know for sure if they are the whole problem.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Friday August 24 2018, @02:08PM (2 children)
I talk about how I grow my own fruit and veg because, wait for it, it might have dirt on it
Don't you have sinks in Brooklyn?
My courgettes this year were a dismal failure - slugs have found us.
(Score: 2) by arulatas on Friday August 24 2018, @03:20PM
Diatomaceous earth is the solution to slugs. Sprinkle some all the way around the plants they are eating. Cuts up the slugs and bugs. Or small containers of beer if I remember correctly.
----- 10 turns around
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Friday August 24 2018, @05:33PM
Don't you have sinks in Brooklyn?
They have the sinks. It's actually the dirt to grow stuff in that most of them are missing.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Friday August 24 2018, @06:25PM
Have you seen the hilarious dialog between God and St. Francis on lawn care? http://www.comptechdoc.org/humor/garden/ [comptechdoc.org]
Another totally nutty thing is that somehow it's okay to spend your leisure time playing computer games (but even now, not everyone views games as an acceptable use of time or thinks the music composed for them could be any good) but if you spend time actually _making_ something-- I once spent a Saturday trying to use a drill press and tilt vises to carve wood into geometric shapes (before 3D printing existed)-- they look at you like you're crazy, and ask why you "wasted" your time on that. Any time you buck social norms and expectations, no matter how harmless and petty your deviation, you can get a lot of static. Most people are such sticks in the mud.
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Friday August 24 2018, @07:12PM
Yeah, the opening of the northern sea routes is mighty small as silver linings go.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @01:23PM (2 children)
Had to look at a map to see where Vladivostok is -- turns out it's a few hundred miles west of the northern Japanese islands and not all that far north of the Koreas.
Maybe Maersk are looking ahead to the lifting of sanctions on N. Korea?
(Score: 2) by richtopia on Friday August 24 2018, @04:57PM
I suspect domestic Russian routes are more lucrative. I'm not very familiar with Russian import/export laws but I suspect there is significant motivation to trade domestically. Connecting the Russian Far East to population centers like St. Petersburg is really difficult. Over land there is the Trans-Siberian Railway which is already at capacity and a road network that doesn't compare well to other countries' interstate systems. Over sea there is the Northwest Passage or Suez route, both are significantly longer and international waters.
But don't worry, soon enough the Transpolar Sea Route will open and ships can sail over international waters across the north pole https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transpolar_Sea_Route [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Friday August 24 2018, @05:12PM
The Northern Route is shorter, which could save lots of cash, and does not include pirates, the strait of Malacca, the Suez Canal, or insane congestion (yet) which pose significant risks to your ship.
As long as you don't let DiCaprio board your ship, and you have enough coats for your cheap crew, it's a better choice (for containers, not for chemicals/oil).
(Score: 3, Insightful) by donkeyhotay on Friday August 24 2018, @02:18PM (4 children)
I despise articles like this that do not include a map! It's no wonder that so many people are ignorant of geography. I mean, I have a rough idea of where Vladivostok is located and where Saint Petersburg is, but a lot of people don't. Sure, I can open up another tab or window and pull up Google maps and find these places, but it's like I'm doing the journalists' job for them. They may not be the "enemy of the people", but they're certainly not our friends. Assholes.
(Score: 3, Informative) by rigrig on Friday August 24 2018, @02:53PM (2 children)
Here you go [ocean-insights.com]
(I was hoping to find a stupid projection for this, and am only a little bit disappointed by the inclusion of those balloons)
No one remembers the singer.
(Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Friday August 24 2018, @05:09PM
I'm surprised it's only 10 days shorter with Suez , Singapore, and Gilbrater bottlenecks.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 2) by donkeyhotay on Friday August 24 2018, @06:47PM
Thanks very much for posting that!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @06:16PM
Well said, it's amazing how often the map is missing. People don't know and this way they won't learn either...
If some journo out there is wondering where to get a map, one good answer is https://osm.org [osm.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @05:19PM (2 children)
the danes must be middlemen for trump's COLLUSION! :)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @09:45PM (1 child)
Ooooh, so THIS is what the 4D chess is actually all about!! So Trump is still conning the US, but the actual end goal is to get his base so worked up that when he announces universal healthcare they'll lap it up. I can get behind this.
(Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Saturday August 25 2018, @09:48AM
I am going to take care of everybody. I don't care if it costs me votes or not. If you can’t take care of your sick in the country, forget it, it’s all over.