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Changes in the Arctic: Background and Issues for Congress
The Coast Guard initiated in its FY2013 budget a program to acquire three new heavy polar
icebreakers, to be followed by the acquisition of up to three new medium polar icebreakers. The
Coast Guard wants to begin construction of the first new heavy polar icebreaker in FY2019 and
have it enter service in 2023. The polar icebreaker program has received about $359.6 million in
acquisition funding through FY2018, including $300 million provided through the Navy's
shipbuilding account and $59.6 million provided through the Coast Guard's procurement account.
The Coast Guard's proposed FY2019 budget requests $750 million in the Coast Guard's
procurement account for the program.
The acquisition cost of a new heavy polar icebreaker had earlier been estimated informally at
roughly $1 billion, but the Coast Guard and Navy now believe that three heavy polar icebreakers
could be acquired for a total cost of about $2.1 billion, or an average of about $700 million per
ship. The first ship will cost more than the other two because it will incorporate design costs for
the class and be at the start of the production learning curve for the class. When combined with
the program's $359.6 million in prior-year funding, the $750 million requested for FY2019 would
fully fund the procurement of the first new heavy polar icebreaker and partially fund the
procurement of the second.
On March 2, 2018, the U.S. Navy, in collaboration with the U.S. Coast Guard under the polar
icebreaker integrated program office, released a request for proposal (RFP) for the advance
procurement and detail design for the Coast Guard's heavy polar icebreaker, with options for
detail design and construction for up to three heavy polar icebreakers.
Issues for Congress for FY2019 for the polar icebreaker program include, inter alia, whether to
approve, reject, or modify the Coast Guard's FY2019 acquisition funding request; whether to use
a contract with options or a block buy contract to acquire the ships; whether to continue providing
at least some of the acquisition funding for the polar icebreaker program through the Navy's
shipbuilding account; and whether to procure heavy and medium polar icebreakers to a common
basic design.219
Search and Rescue (SAR)220
Overview
Increasing sea and air traffic through Arctic waters has increased concerns regarding Arctic-area
search and rescue (SAR) capabilities.221 Table 1 presents figures on ship casualties in Arctic
Circle waters from 2005 to 2014, as shown in the 2015 edition of an annual report on shipping
and safety by the insurance company Allianz Global Corporate & Specialty.
219 For more on the polar icebreaker program, see CRS Report RL34391, Coast Guard Polar Icebreaker Program:
Background and Issues for Congress, by Ronald O'Rourke.
220 This section prepared by Ronald O'Rourke, Specialist in Naval Affairs, Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Trade
Division.
221 See, for example, Timothy William James Smith, Search and Rescue in the Arctic: Is the U.S. Prepared? RANDCorporation, 2017, 148 pp. (Dissertation report RGSD-382.)
Congressional Research Service
47
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O'Rourke, Ronald. Changes in the Arctic: Background and Issues for Congress, report, August 1, 2018; Washington D.C.. (https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1248258/m1/52/: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, UNT Digital Library, https://digital.library.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Government Documents Department.