Transport committee  There are different designs. Because this technology has been held back for so long, and technology has moved so far forward, it's not clear what the dominant design is going to be. Are they going to be a cigar shape? Are they going to be one of these flat-shaped ones that take care of aerodynamic lift?

Transport committee  No. It's a very good question. I've said that in Manitoba for roughly $100 million you could build a hangar and buy three 20-tonne-lift airships and you could serve all of Manitoba, with all the communities that are there. Today we spend roughly $10 million every year on ice roads, and that's just getting goods in.

Transport committee  I absolutely believe that, but maybe I'll let Mr. Russell speak.

Transport committee  First of all, of course you cannot have an airship that's bigger than the hangar you have to put it in. You have to decide how big an airship you're going to have and then how big a hangar you're going to have. You have to have a hangar. The price will depend on the airship size, obviously.

Transport committee  I actually did an estimate of that. Looking at a 50-tonne-equivalent lift, in my view, we need somewhere between 100 and 250 of these airships right now. If we had them available, they could be used. Mining would probably be the biggest single use. There are many locations where, as Mr.

Transport committee  So we have to adapt the technology for Canadian conditions. It can be done.

Transport committee  Or minus 50 degrees or worse.

Transport committee  Right. Let me deal first of all with the question of weather, because in Canada we always like to talk about the weather—we have a lot of it. We have a very fierce winter, and the airships that exist today are basically fair-weather flyers, so they would fly in summer, spring, and fall.

Transport committee  Yes—Russia. The Russian RosAeroSystems have an airship and they have flown it in the wintertime. That's a government-owned project, really, out of the military of Russia, from what I understand. I don't know that much about it.

Transport committee  No, they are not using it for freight. They've used it for surveillance and for looking at the hydro lines and so on, but they have not invested heavily in using this. Although they have a problem in Siberia that's very similar to our problem in the north, and they are probably the closest....

Transport committee  Mr. Russell may be better at talking to the logistics than I, but by and large, they'll start at the end of the roads. You'll truck as far as you can, because it's less expensive to move by truck, and you'll use the airship only where there are no roads. So I would see places such as Hay River, Thompson, Rouyn-Noranda, Cochrane, or Moosonee....

Transport committee  Exactly. And you wouldn't necessarily maintain the airship there, because those skilled trades might find a better location in Ottawa, Montreal, Winnipeg, or Toronto. So you'd bring those airships back. You might build them here, but they would live their life up north because that's where they do their work.

Transport committee  Typically they're now using diesel engines, or Jet-A. Some are using gas. However, you can use almost any fuel. In fact, the old Zeppelins used a mixture of methane and hydrogen, which was very environmentally benign 75 years ago. The advantage of an airship is that it's so big, you can have a very large low-pressure tank.

Transport committee  No question, because it would remove some of those regulatory barriers we have today to do that, and that would be part of it, yes.

Transport committee  I'd be very happy to do that.