BBC Future takes a look at ambitious Russian plans to exploit vast reserves of undersea oil and natural gas in the arctic using nuclear robot subs and more. The catchy name for it is Project Iceberg. Here’s a few snippets to whet your appetite.
...The centrepiece of Iceberg is the 182m-long (600 ft) Belgorod, the largest nuclear submarine ever built. The Belgorod will carry out underwater surveys and lay communication cables under the ice, but its main role will be to act as a mothership for a flotilla of smaller submarines….
...But perhaps the most ambitious part of Project Iceberg are the plans for the word’s first underwater nuclear power plants to act as pitstops for the swarms of submarines that will be deployed.
These underwater power stations will sit on the sea bed and act as recharging points for passing unmanned subs. The current design is for a 24-megawatt reactor with a lifetime of 25 years. Each one will operate almost entirely autonomously with technicians only visiting once a year for routine maintenance….
...At a conference in March, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said development of the Arctic region would help to build neighbourly relations with surrounding states and that it should be a "territory of peace and cooperation". But this is hardly consistent with other Russian activity in the area.
Some 50 former Soviet Arctic military bases have recently been reactivated. The Russian army has new Arctic Brigades, and showed off special military vehicles for polar operations in this year’s May Day parade. Russia‘s Northern Fleet is also to get its own nuclear-powered icebreaker, as well as “ice capable” patrol vessels, essentially mini-icebreakers armed with anti-ship missiles…
Unfortunately, this is not a bad cold-war thriller novel or B movie dystopian drama if the BBC is to be believed. Nobody tell Donald Trump, or he’ll want an even bigger and crazier program to boast about. This looks like Putin’s idea of how to Make Russia Great Again — as a northern Petro-Nuclear State.
The simplest way to derail this is to accelerate away from fossil fuels, dropping the price of oil to where this can’t pay for itself. Considering the Trump administration’s love of fossil fuels and denials of global warming, you have to wonder if they’re not already silent partners in Project Iceberg.
