Adapting to a Foggy Future Along Trans-Arctic Shipping Routes

Rapid retreat of Arctic sea ice extends the area of open ocean for new trans-Arctic shipping routes. However, the projected routes may be too optimistic in terms of savings in shipping costs from shortened trans-Arctic distances as they do not consider the increased sea fog frequency (SFF) over areas of the retreating sea ice. We show that delays due to sea fog can be 1-4 days, about 23%-27% along the Northwest Passage and 4%-11% along the Northern Sea Route than previous estimated. We design a route based on the projected sea-ice extent and SFF. The new route can reduce the sailing time by 0.3-1 day by detouring the routes with lighter impacts of sea fog. More importantly the new route will lower the risk of catastrophic accidents compared to the shortest route and saves the additional costs due to unscheduled port calls.