Tired of the same old shipping lanes? Route your ware through the Arctic Ocean in as little as 10 years! Faster, easier access to oil and gas reserves guaranteed.

The Arctic Ocean—the new open sea.

Just ask Peter Wadhams, a professor at the University of Cambridge and a top polar specialist who has been studying the Arctic ice since the 1960s.

“The Catlin Arctic Survey data supports the new consensus view—based on seasonal variation of ice extent and thickness, changes in temperatures, winds and especially ice composition—that the Arctic will be ice-free in summer within about 20 years, and that much of the decrease will be happening within 10 years.”

After trekking across 435 kilometers of ice earlier this year, the Catlin Arctic Survey found that ice-floes were about 1.8 meters thick—typical of ice formed during the past winter and vulnerable to melting, according to an article in the BBC. The team had expected to cross areas of older ice, thicker and more resilient.

The fine print for the new shipping route? Accelerated warming, water acidification and changing patterns of circulation in the oceans and atmosphere. Polar explorers and their sled dogs are also bearing the brunt.

Said explorer Pen Hadow who led the expedition: “Dogs can swim but they can’t tow a sledge through the water which is what’s needed now.

“Now we have to wear immersion suits and swim and we need sledges that can float. I can forsee needing sledges that are more like canoes that pull you over the ice.”