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Optimism on Northern waterways Resource development projects mean higher demand for shipping services
Lyndsay Herman
Northern News Services
Published Friday, July 19, 2013
NUNAVUT
Three major players in the North's cargo transportation business are seeing a greater demand on their services for the 2013 shipping services.
The newest vessel in Nunavut Sealink and Supply Inc. is the Claude A. Desgagnes, which was added to the fleet last summer. - photo courtesy of Nunavut Sealink and Supply Inc.
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"It's shaping up to be very busy," said Scott Dryden, director of marketing and customer service for Northern Transportation Company Ltd.
Resource development projects are one of the contributors to increased cargo volumes being shipped by companies which service remote northern locations.
"We have new commitments, new business, namely in the Baffin area with the Mary River Mine," said Waguih Rayes, general manager of Desgagnes Transarctik Inc., the managing partner company of Nunavut Sealink and Supply Inc. "We're providing four voyages for the mine this year, however in anticipation of that addition last year, we increased our core fleet by one ship so that we don't affect essential services for the communities."
Last July, Nunavut Sealink and Supply Inc. added the Claude A. Desgagnes to its fleet, bringing their total number of vessels to six.
This year, Nunavut Sealink and Supply, which has a contract with the Government of Nunavut to supply all but one of the territory's communities, is set to move 500,000 cubic metres of cargo.
Nunavut Easter Arctic Shipping Inc. (NEAS) has also increased their fleet, welcoming the M/V Mitiq to its fleet this year and bringing the total number of ships servicing customers in Nunavut and Nunavik to four.
NEAS also opened a new office in Iqaluit in anticipation of increased work in the city.
"In Iqaluit, it's a community where we have a lot of cargo," said Suzanne Paquin, president and chief executive officer for NEAS. "We're also the government carrier for that community, so there is a tremendous amount of cargo and with the new airport coming, we thought that it was necessary for us to have an office."
Recovering economy
Dryden said higher demand from communities and industry has brought vessels back into service for the barging company after some were parked or barely used as a result of the economic slowdown in 2008.
Resource development in the Sahtu, where Imperial Oil recently became the first company approved to conduct horizontal hydraulic fracturing, has NTCL making 11 trips down the Mackenzie River this season, an increase of about 10 per cent, with a stop at Norman Wells each time.
"The potential in the Sahtu region is obviously huge ... we're finalizing plans with a couple of the companies doing work there to carry cargo for them this season," Dryden said. "It's definitely an area of growth.
"We've definitely got the capacity which can now be put to use. The volumes that they are moving in there is pretty big for their camps and all their associated supplies for drilling and that type of thing."
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