If Congress funds the start of a new heavy polar icebreaker so that construction can begin in 2020, then the vessel will be ready around 2024 or 2025, Coast Guard Vice Commandant Adm. Charles Michel told a House panel on Tuesday.
Michel told the House Transportation and Infrastructure Coast Guard Subcommittee that based on discussions with his shipbuilding experts, icebreaker experts in other countries, and domestic industry, his best estimate for having a new heavy vessel “online” is 2024 or 2025.
The Coast Guard’s FY ’17 budget request for a new heavy polar icebreaker is $147.6 million for design of the ship and the start of construction in 2020. The Senate Appropriations Committee has recommended $1 billion in the Navy’s shipbuilding budget to construct the icebreaker while the House Appropriations Homeland Security (HAC-HS) Subcommittee is proposing $37.7 million for the ship.
The HAC-HS believes the Coast Guard doesn’t have its plans for the new icebreaker properly lined up yet.
“While the Coast Guard is making progress on this acquisition program, it has not sufficiently developed a comprehensive procurement strategy, validated resource requirements, or planned activities beyond fiscal year 2018 to justify the full” FY ’17 request, the HAC HS says in a draft report accompanying their version of the FY’17 spending bill for the Department of Homeland Security. The recommended icebreaker funds “will allow the Coast Guard to aggressively continue its acquisition activities during fiscal year 2017 and through early fiscal year 2018,” the report says.
The House Appropriations Committee was originally scheduled to mark up the FY ’17 DHS bill on Tuesday but delayed consideration until next Wednesday to allow more time for facts to surface from the terrorist shooting at a nightclub in Orlando over the weekend. This delay “will allow time for careful consideration of any necessary changes that may or may not be needed” to the bill, Rep. Hal Rogers (R-Ky.), chairman of the committee, said in a statement Monday night.
Michel told Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Transportation Coast Guard Subcommittee, that the Coast Guard needs more than one heavy icebreaker to meet its polar missions. A second heavy polar icebreaker would enable a self-rescue capability for the icebreaking fleet and the High Latitude Study says three are needed, Michel said.
The Coast Guard currently has one operational heavy Polar Icebreaker, the Polar Star, but that ship only has five to seven years of service left unless some type of recapitalization effort is undertaken, Michel said. The Coast Guard has a second heavy polar icebreaker, the Polar Sea, which is not operational.
Michel said the Coast Guard will have a material assessment of the Polar Sea ready for the committee by July 24. He said an Analysis of Alternatives is underway on how to “bridge out” to when the new heavy icebreaker is ready.
Hunter noted that if the Coast Guard pursued some sort of block buy for the heavy icebreaker program it could save $100 million if two ships were budgeted for. Michel said his staff is “looking at potential block buys” of the heavy icebreakers.
The Coast Guard has one medium icebreaker that it operates in certain areas of the polar regions but the Healy can’t break the thicker ice that a heavy icebreaker can, Michel said. A heavy icebreaker provides year-round “assured global access to ice covered regions.”