Researches showed undiscovered resources of oil and gas in Arctic region by Tatiana Hadarova

New discoveries made in Arctic region showed that there are another 25 percent of the world's undiscovered sources of oil and gas, hidden deep beneath the sea floor. Circumpolar nations, but mainly Russia, Canada and U.S. will now start to compete for potentially rich reserves of oil, gas and minerals. Under the international Law of the Sea treaty these countries have to establish boundaries off their northern coasts. This Law allows to rule over a country's continental shelf beyond the normal boundary of 200 miles, but only if the country can prove its purposes through scientific evidence. The issue for the U.S. is that the country is not party to the Law of the Sea treaty, but with the new evidences of the presence of oil and gas the Bush administration is pushing for its approval. Researches made last year showed, that Alaska's continental slope extends more than 100 nautical miles further from the U.S. coast and possibly might overlap with the shelf from Canada. The task for the U.S. federal official is to carve out the boundaries with bordering nations. According to officials the borders with Russia are almost established. U.S. is now organizing grand expedition, costing at least $1.2 million, to the area of Chukchi Sea, where scientists are mapping more than 6.200 miles with the sonar from the deck of an icebreaker. The results show new images of unexplored region and give the most detailed portrait of the ocean's bottom. The data will be applied to a variety research topics, including ecosystems and climate circulations models. But according to scientists, problem might be shrinking polar ice, caused by global warming and that urges the nations' claims.

by Tatiana Hadarova for PocketNews (http://pocketnews.tv)

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