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IS DEEP-SEA MINING WORTH the Race Is on to Exploit— and Protect—The Ocean Oor by Thomas Peacock and Matthew H

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IS DEEP-SEA MINING WORTH the Race Is on to Exploit— and Protect—The Ocean Oor by Thomas Peacock and Matthew H NATURAL RESOURCES IS DEEP-SEA MINING WORTH The race is on to exploit— and protect—the ocean oor By Thomas Peacock and Matthew H. Alford IT? Photograph by Brett Stevens 72 Scientifi c American, May 2018 sad0518Peac3pRv.indd 72 3/19/18 5:35 PM MANGANESE NODULES plucked from the ocean bottom contain valuable metals. May 2018, ScientificAmerican.com 73 sad0518Peac3pRv.indd 73 3/19/18 5:35 PM Thomas Peacock is a mechanical engineering professor and director of the Environmental Dynamics Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Matthew H. Alford is a physical oceanography professor and associate director of the Marine Physical WE ARE 50 Laboratory at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. KILOMETERS OFF THE COAST OF , 1,000 SAN DIEGO of water. Onboard our research vessel, the RV Sally Ride, are eight containers, each as large as a compact car, fi lled with sediment dredged from the deep Pacifi c Ocean fl oor. This morning we mixed the sediment with seawater in a huge tank, and over an hour we pumped the entire contents through a wide discharge hose that extended 60 meters down into the water from the side of the ship. For six hours we tracked a plume of particles that pursuing deep-sea mining be cause they think it can dispersed down and away from the boat, pulled by be less costly than land-based mining, especially as ocean currents. A sophisticated array of sensors hang- IN BRIEF terrestrial producers are forced to turn to sites that ing from the ship allowed us to measure the plume have lower-grade ores that are also harder to extract. Demand for certain shape and sediment concentration in the water col- metals is rising rap- Certain countries that do not have many mineral umn, the signals getting ever weaker. idly. Some eco nom- re sources on land, such as Japan and South Korea, Our goal was to obtain ocean data about a pressing ical land deposits are want to get into the game by prospecting at sea, where issue that could soon greatly impact the ocean: min- running low, so coun- some de posits are vast. In September 2017 the Japan ing the deep seafl oor. tries and com panies Oil, Gas and Metals National Corporation conducted After years of contemplation, governments and may opt to mine the one of the fi rst large commercial trials. A prototype deep seabed. companies around the world are beginning to explore ex cavator gathered tons of zinc and other metals from Nickel, copper and the deep seabed for valuable minerals, chief among deposits 1,600 meters deep near Okinawa, inside cobalt are plentiful in them nickel, copper and cobalt. One type of deposit— fi st-sized nodules Japan’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ)—its national fi st-sized nodules containing these metals—lies thou- strewn across the waters. Small is land nations and regions, such as Ton- sands of meters underwater. Robotic collector ma - ocean bottom in var- ga and Cook Is lands, which have limited resources to chines, each one as big as a combine harvester, would ious locations deeper build such an in dustry themselves, are discussing crawl along the seabed, sucking up the top sediment than 4,000 meters. whether to o er mining rights inside their EEZs to layer containing the nodules, kicking up a cloud of Machines would outside investors. And the In ternational Seabed Au- scoop up nodules, sediment in their wake. The collectors would pump thority (ISA), which regulates commercial activity in casting sediment the nodules up wide, kilometers-long tubes to large across the seafl oor. international waters, has issued 28 exploration per- surface vessels. The ships would sift through the Processing ships mits to institutions from 20 countries to sample sea- material, separating out millions of dense metallic would send sedi- fl oor minerals. nodules a day, and re turn the remaining sediment ment into the ocean Scientists are working hard to learn more about back into the sea, sending a plume downward. above. But land min- potentially damaging e ects and what steps could How would all of this activity a ect the life on the ing has environmen- minimize them. Right now governments, industry, the ocean fl oor and in the waters above? Our discharge tal eff ects, too. ISA, universities and science organizations are coop- to test was an early step toward one part of an answer. Finding ways erating on shared research ventures akin to ours. minimize impacts Global de mand for metals is rising relentlessly. could lead to wise Unlike the history of coal, oil, phosphorus and other Some of the higher-grade land-based mines are run- regulations—if re- natural resources, the scientifi c community has an ning low. Several companies, such as Global Sea Min- search continues as opportunity to work with all parties to establish e ec- eral Resources (GSR) and UK Seabed Resources, are the industry forms. tive safeguards before a large extraction industry 74 Scientifi c American, May 2018 sad0518Peac3pRv.indd 74 3/19/18 5:35 PM Treasure Hunt High Concentrations of Minerals Many countries and companies mine the shallow ocean fl oor for oil, sand and diamonds. Now they are exploring the deep seabed for critical metals such as nickel and cobalt. Researchers have mapped three types of deposits in inter- national waters that seem particu- larly promising ( colored regions ). Manga nese nodules may be the Manganese nodules Depth most economical to extract. Cobalt crusts (meters) 2,000 Massive sulfides (near hydrothermal vents) 4,000 Tectonic plate boundaries 6,000 Exploration Licenses Exclusive The International Seabed Authority, which Exclusive economic zone (Hawaii, U.S.) economic regulates mining in international waters, zone (Mexico) has issued 16 exploration licenses ( colors ) for manganese nodules in the Clarion-Clipperton Fracture Zone, a region of the Pacifi c Ocean seafl oor about the size of Europe. Most of the rocks lie in water deeper than 4,000 meters. As the authority grants permits, it designates reserved areas for possible future exploitation by developing countries, as well as protected 0 100 400 600 miles areas where no mining can occur. Some coun- tries are also searching within their exclusive Exclusive economic zone (Line Islands, Kiribati) 0 500 1,000 kilometers economic zone—their national waters. Exploration areas; each color Reserved areas represents a different contractor Protected areas forms and to determine the relative impacts of sea-based min- Three principal forms of deposits are promising. One com- ing versus land-based mining. prises active and inactive hydrothermal vents—fi ssures opened by volcanic activity that spew hot material along the boundar- NICKEL, COPPER AND COBALT REWARDS ies of tectonic plates. These so-called seafl oor massive sulfi des fi rst discovered ocean mineral deposits a are rich local deposits of minerals such as copper, zinc, lead and century and a half ago, in the Kara Sea o Siberia. The treasures gold. Papua New Guinea has granted Canadian fi rm Nautilus were confi rmed in the 1870s, during the celebrated HMS Chal- Minerals a license to extract these sulfi des at an inactive site ) lenger expedition that advanced modern oceanography. In the known as Solwara 1 inside its EEZ. The ISA has granted seven inset 1970s the planned an elaborate hoax in which an ostensible sulfi de exploration contracts at inactive sites in international dive for manganese nodules in the Pacifi c Ocean would be cov- waters. Scientists have called for a mining moratorium at active er for its attempt to exhume the sunken Soviet submarine K-129. sites because of their unique ecosystems. But technological challenges and low mineral prices discour- A second type of deposit, cobalt crusts, forms on the hard ); INTERNATIONAL SEABED AUTHORITY. DATABASE BY S. CLAUS aged actual commercial exploration. rock summits and fl anks of seamounts, as metals naturally Interest has picked up markedly over the past decade. In - precipitate out of the seawater. Such crusts grow very slowly, a world map map world creasing global population, urbanization, rising consumption few millimeters every million years, typically reaching thick- and aggressive development of technologies that depend heavi- nesses of fi ve to 10 centimeters. In addition to cobalt, they con- ly on certain metals are pushing market forecasts substantially tain nickel and other desirable metals. Although the ISA has higher. For ex ample, annual global demand for nickel, now issued four exploration licenses for the western Pacifi c Ocean, around two million metric tons, is estimated to rise 50 percent mining of cobalt crusts is challenging because it is di cult to PUBLISHED BY MARIBUS, BY 2010 ( PUBLISHED by 2030. Around 76 million metric tons exist in land-based strip o the crusts from underlying rock and because the rock . ACCESSED WWW.MARINEREGIONS.ORG AT ON NOVEMBER 24, 2016 ( reserves. Roughly the same amount, in the form of nodules, lies faces are typically steep and hard to negotiate underwater. on the seafl oor within the Clarion-Clipperton Fracture Zone The majority of deep-sea mining ventures target deposits of (CCFZ) alone, an elongated abyssal plain stretching from polymetallic “manganese” nodules. (The remainder of this arti- Hawaii to the Baja California Peninsula. The story for cobalt is cle addresses just this kind of mining.) The nodules are strewn WORLD OCEAN REVIEW 1. Flanders Marine Institute Flanders Marine Institute similar: land reserves of about seven million metric tons are across the seafl oor or are partially buried in the sediment ET AL. SOURCES: matched or even exceeded by nodules in the zone. across many large areas. They form at depths of several thou- Maps by Dolly Holmes May 2018, Scientifi cAmerican.com 75 sad0518Peac3pRv.indd 75 3/19/18 5:36 PM sand meters as metals precipitate out of seawater around a The ISA grants exploration licenses to tracts that are 150,000 piece of detritus, forming a kernel that grows in diameter at square kilometers.
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