Siberian scientists prove Russia has right to huge Arctic mineral resources

Undersea rocks on the Mendeleev Ridge match those of the New Siberian Islands, says Valery Vernikovsky of the Trofimuk Institute of Petroleum Geology and Geophysics in Novosibirsk. The scientist explained that a series of studies, including sample drilling at a depth of over 2,500 metres, give sufficient evidence that that the Lomonosov and the Mendeleev Ridges are made of continental crust about 460-470 million years old.

'We prove that part of the Arctic seabed is composed of continental blocks, which substantiates our claim to the underwater Lomonosov and Mendeleev ridges,' he said. 'In 2012, we took rock samples from the Mendeleev Ridge at a depth of more than 2,500 metres'. 

'Their age shocked many of us as these rocks turned out to be approximately 460-470 million years. Earlier they were believed to be younger. This, too, confirmed the validity of our concept and our application.'

The first Russia's application to expand its hydrocarbon-rich Arctic shelf in 2001 was rejected by the UN due to poor knowledge of the matter. 

Now Russia is finalising a new application, based on the work of the Siberian scientists. 

Norway, Canada, Denmark and the United States have also laid claims to the territory.

Under the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, signed by Russia in 1997, if a country can prove its continental shelf extends beyond the 200-mile limit, it can claim a right to more of the ocean floor.

If Russia proves that the Lomonosov Ridge and the Mendeleev Ridge are an extension of the Russian continental shelf, the country will receive the right to the additional 1.2 million square kilometres in the Arctic and to the development of huge oil and gas fields in the triangle formed by the Chukotka Peninsula, Murmansk and the North Pole.