As Nordic governments look at ways to strengthen Arctic cooperation, industrial and business interests in the northern parts of the countries lobby the construction of a grand new railway line.
This is the right time for bold joint intiatives, Finnish and Norwegian company representatives said in a meeting in Kirkenes, Norway, this week.
Gas meets ore
The railway plans come as Arctic sea ice melting opens up new shipping routes and industrial opportunities. A rail link from Finland to the Norwegian Arctic coast will boost transportation of a wide range of goods, among them ores from rich Finnish and Swedish deposits and export commodities from the Baltic countries, project promoters argue. For Norway, the railway can become a “rolling pipeline” for transportation of Norwegian LNG to the European market, Felix Tschudi, CEO of the Tschudi Shipping, said at the meeting.
Tschudi believes that train transportation of LNG might be of interest also for Russian companies, among them Novatek and the Yamal LNG.
He also argues that the railway project, despite a current economic slowdown in Finland, is fully possible as soon as there is necessary political will.
The Kirkenes alternative
Several alternative routes are on the table of the regional rail infrastructure developers, among them to Narvik, Skibotn and to Kirkenes. According to Hannu Hernesniemi, a representative of the Finnish National Emergency Supply Agency, the Kirkenes alternative is the commercially most viable route. The Narvik alternative could run into capacity problems following the expanding activities of the LKAB, while the Skibotn alternative would require the construction of a totally new port, Hernesniemi says.
So far, the Finnish-Norwegian railway project has been promoted primarily by the Finnish side. A report from the Finnish Confederation of Finnish Industries on business opportunities is in the pipeline and is expected to be published in the course of the first half of the year. That work is headed by former Finnish PM Paavo Lipponen and is expected to include also proposals on railway developments in the region.
Much clearly depends on Finland. “Norway will be ready to build as soon as Finland is ready”, Stig Nerdal, initiator of the meeting in Kirkenes, says. His company Transportutvikling is a Norwegian contributor in the project Arctic Corridor.
