China-Russia Arctic Shipping Push Accelerates With New Ice-Class Container Ships

China’s NewNew Shipping Line and Russia’s state nuclear corporation Rosatom are advancing plans to build five large ice-class container ships aimed at making commercial shipping on the Northern Sea Route a year-round operation.

The companies are in an advanced stage of developing the project, Rosatom Arctic representative Vladimir Panov earlier this week at the Eastern Economic Forum, describing the planned Arc7 vessels as potentially “revolutionary” ships for Arctic shipping. 

The ships have been designed by Russia’s United Shipbuilding Corp. and would carry more than 4,800 twenty-foot equivalent units, making them the largest container vessels specifically designed for the Arctic.

The 255-meter