Abstract: This paper analyzes the source of goods travelling through the Arctic passages, and examines trades generated from the Arctic area, including oil and gas exploitation. Furthermore, it assesses the present situation for maritime cargo, which travels from the Far East to both Northwestern Europe, and North America. Two main types of cargo that will go through the Arctic passages in the future are identified. First, about 10 million tons of cargo will travel from Russia and the Nordic Arctic area to the Far East in a one-way trade flow of Liquefied Natural Gas(LNG) by 2030. Second, there are the two-way trade flows of containerized cargo from the Far East to Europe and the United States through the Northeast Passage, the central Passage and the Northwest Passage. This cargo will travel through the arctic area, to relieve pressure on their present routes from the Far East to North-Western Europe and North America. Therefore, the Northwest Passage could share cargo routes from the Far East to the United States. If navigation is technically possible in all seasons, with lower cost ships as ordinary ones,and assuming to sharing traditional canal routes 50%,By 2030, the maximum amount of container freight that will go through the Arctic passages should be approximately 17.43 million TEUs, which is 85% of the traditional canal routes in 2011. The conclusion drawn from this is: in the near future gas transportation in the Northeast Passage will play a major role, and but for transit shipping,more shipping demand for Arctic sea routes will be container transpotation. The shipping costs between by using the Arctic passages and by using the traditional canal routes are also compared in the paper.

Key words: Arctic shipping routes, canal routes, cargo, container transportation, LNG, assessment