Deep sea mining becomes a new battlefield for energy transformation

Tech 2023-07-19 21:47:34 Source: Network

Reported on Reference News Network on July 19thAccording to the website of the French weekly "Express" on July 10th, Kingston, the capital of Jamaica, has rarely become an international negotiation center. However, in July this year, in a gray building with a flat surface in this city, the scene of determining the future of the deep sea was unfolding

Reported on Reference News Network on July 19thAccording to the website of the French weekly "Express" on July 10th, Kingston, the capital of Jamaica, has rarely become an international negotiation center. However, in July this year, in a gray building with a flat surface in this city, the scene of determining the future of the deep sea was unfolding. The 168 members of the International Seabed Authority will make a decision on a key issue at a general meeting: what should be the regulatory framework for Deep sea mining?

Weak regulatory framework

Since its establishment in 1994, the International Seabed Authority has been responsible for authorizing deep-sea scientific and industrial exploration activities outside the exclusive economic zone of each country. Little is known about this deep-sea region, but it is said to contain rich mineral resources. Manganese, iron, copper, nickel, cobalt, lead, and zinc... billions of tons of various metals have been discovered. The official characterizes the deep sea as a "common heritage of humanity", and its future is uncertain between development and protection.

The International Seabed Authority, with about 30 staff and a budget of less than $6 million, has long been a low-key unit. But in the past two years, it has become the focus of attention. This is because in June 2021, to everyone's surprise, Nauru, a small island country located in the Micronesian Islands, jointly applied for a mining license with the Canadian Metals Corporation (TMC). This triggered a regulatory requirement that requires the International Seabed Authority to develop mining regulations for this mining activity within two years.

Denis Bai, an economist and research lecturer at the University of Western Brittany in France, stressed: "Since then, many stakeholders have become agitated. Before then, people thought that there was no economic benefit in exploiting these resources, but with the energy transformation, this has become an urgent problem."

The two-year deadline specified in the regulations officially expired on July 9th of this year, but despite exceeding the deadline, discussions continue without producing a clear framework.

Julian Rochette, head of the Marine and International Biodiversity Governance Program at the Institute of Sustainable Development and International Relations, emphasized: "The task is daunting. We still have a long way to go before finalizing the regulatory framework, as many stakeholders oppose this activity." Currently, due to the lack of a regulatory framework, it is theoretically impossible to issue any mining permits, but some believe that, The expiration of the two-year term is likely to lead TMC and its CEO Gerard Barron to act out of industrial ambitions.

Huge economic benefits

He aimed at the Clarion Clipperton Fracture zone, a vast sea area located in the north central Pacific Ocean and nearly 5000 meters deep, which is full of strange polymetallic nodules. These stones have a diameter of about 10 centimeters and are composed of various metals, covering an area of nearly 5 million square kilometers. According to the estimation of the International Seabed Authority, this is an invaluable treasure house of 34 billion tons, including 340 million tons of nickel and 275 million tons of copper. Michael Lodge, Secretary General of the International Seabed Authority, even predicted that: "The deposit contains more nickel, manganese and cobalt than all land resources."

Nowadays, TMC claims to have sufficient technical capabilities to collect and process these nodules. The company is expected to make a profit of $31 billion over a 25 year mining period. Balun told the Express: "Profits depend on the quality of materials. However, in the seabed, resources are highly concentrated. Therefore, the profit per ton of seabed ore is much higher than that of onshore ore

Rochette's view is relatively restrained: "In the 1970s and 1990s, we immediately thought of this as a paradise for minerals, but we quickly realized the technical complexity of this activity and the economic benefits could not be guaranteed." In fact, few companies venture into this field. Except for TMC, only one mining company - Belgian Global Marine Mineral Resources - has developed a machine to collect these nodules.

Difficult to assess impact

However, scientists and non-governmental organizations have become concerned about the environmental consequences of such activities. Although the deep sea contains abundant mineral resources, from a scientific research perspective, the deep sea is still an unknown world. Javier Escartan, the research director of the French National Centre for Scientific Research and an expert on the seabed, said worriedly, "We don't know what kind of ecosystems exist or what their ecological functions are. We suspect that organisms will be seriously affected by the pollution caused by mining activities." The problem is the sediment raised by underwater "harvesters", the noise generated by machines and high-power navigation lights, These may all interfere with existing species. Pierre Marie Saladan, who studies deep-sea ecosystems at the French Institute for Ocean Development, said, "We agree with the consensus in the scientific community that at the current level of science, we do not have sufficient knowledge to determine the basic condition of these ecosystems and therefore cannot evaluate potential impacts

Upon hearing the concerns of scientists, France took a tough stance in November last year. President Makron announced that he supported a comprehensive ban on all Deep sea mining activities. Around the world, nearly 20 other countries have also taken a similar stance, demanding a delay in mining, such as New Zealand and Switzerland. Some major companies, including BMW, Renault, and Microsoft, have also joined these countries and decided not to consider deep-sea metals in their procurement, citing that these resources are not necessary globally.

But this does not mean that the ocean will escape the fate of being mined. In June this year, Norway proposed opening up 280000 square kilometers of the seabed within its exclusive economic zone for mining, which sparked anger among environmentalists and some elected representatives of the country. Escartan said, "A fundamental question arises: do we really need these resources, or can we find other ways to achieve ecological transformation without the need to use these resources

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