Economics

The World Has Discovered a $1 Trillion Ocean

Now what to do with it. The Arctic is open for business, and everyone wants a piece. A council at Davos lays down some rules.
Photographer: NBC NewsWire via Getty Images
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As chairman of investments at Guggenheim Partners, Scott Minerd thought he had a realistic view on how big an economic challenge climate change poses.

Then, at a Hoover Institution conference almost three years ago, he met former U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz. Minerd recalled him saying: “Scott, imagine that you woke up tomorrow morning, and the headline on the newspapers was, 'The World Has Discovered a New Ocean.’” The opening of the Arctic, Shultz told him, may be one of the most important events since the end of the ice age, some 12,000 years ago.