Ratify the law of the sea treaty: implications for Alaska and why there's no time to lose.

• Author: Gupta, Sourabh
• Position: RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT

The views expressed herein are the authors' own and not those of Samuel International and/or the University of Alaska.

In August 2007, a Russian expedition led by its most famous polar explorer, Artur Chilingarov, planted a Russian flag in a capsule on the Arctic seabed directly underneath the North Pole. The Arctic is Russian, Chilingarov bellowed. "We must prove the North Pole is an extension of the Russian coastal shelf." Indeed, in 2001, the Russian Federation had made a vast territorial claim to almost one-half of the Arctic sea-bed in its submission to a 21-member United Nations scientific body called the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf.

Unfazed by Moscow, the United States and fellow Arctic states criticized the extent of the Russian claim, particularly the attempt to declare an underwater mountain--known as Lomonosov Ridge, that runs through the central Arctic Ocean Basin--as an extension of the Russian landmass. As per the U.S. interpretation, the Lomonosov Ridge "is an oceanic part of the Arctic basin and not a natural component of the continental margins of either Russia or of any state." The flag that Chilingarov planted in 2007 had in fact been planted on the Lomonosov Ridge, beneath the North Pole.

The U.N. body has since advised the Russians to revise their submission with regard to the central Arctic Ocean Basin. Nevertheless, submissions by Canada and Denmark--due in 2013 and 2014 respectively--are also expected to claim portions of the Lomonosov Ridge as extensions of their own national landmasses.

Race for Turf

Clearly, a scramble for territory is under way in the Arctic. Furthermore, this scramble is likely to be accentuated in the years ahead by a confluence of factors: the vast natural and hydrocarbon resources of the region and the unprecedented rate of Arctic ice-melt that is opening this previously inaccessible region to commercial shipping as well as natural resource development. Even non-Arctic states are entering the fray. China, India and Japan have all expressed interest in becoming "permanent observers" to the Arctic Council, an inter-governmental forum consisting of the eight Arctic littorals--and in mid-August, Chinas polar icebreaker, Xuelong, became the first ever Chinese ship to traverse these waters.

As per a July 2008 U.S. Geological Survey study, the total undiscovered conventional oil and gas resources in the Arctic is estimated to be of the order of 90 billion barrels of oil, 1.7...