.
.
Energy Challenges - Omnia per Scientiam >> .
To meet the world's growing demand for batteries, private companies have turned their attention to mining the ocean floor. But this practice could come at a greater cost to the planet than it's worth.
Terrestrial mining doesn’t have a perfect record, it comes with a long list of environmental and human rights abuses, including pollution and child labor. All this to dig up raw materials like nickel, manganese, and cobalt that are necessary for our lithium-ion batteries.
Some strategies for a carbon-free future depend on making these batteries in much larger numbers and using them as a power source for electric cars or a storage method for electricity generated by renewables.
But another source of these materials could lie at the bottom of the ocean. Potato-sized lumps called polymetallic nodules are rich in manganese, copper, cobalt, nickel, and other precious metals; and they are found in abundance in some areas like the Clarion-Clipperton Zone that stretches from Hawaii to Mexico.
History’s Largest Mining Operation Is About to Begin
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/... .
"Regulations for ocean mining have never been formally established. The United Nations has given that task to an obscure organization known as the International Seabed Authority, which is housed in a pair of drab gray office buildings at the edge of Kingston Harbour, in Jamaica. Unlike most UN bodies, the ISA receives little oversight."
Treasure and Turmoil in the Deep Sea
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/14/op... .
"As a result of the mining, animals already living near their physiological limits would be eating mouthfuls of poisonous dirt for breakfast, respiring through clogged gills and squinting through a muddy haze to communicate."
Seabed mining is coming — bringing mineral riches and fears of epic extinctions
https://www.nature.com/articles/d4158... .
"The sea floor there boasts one of the world’s largest untapped collections of rare-earth elements. Some 4,000 metres below the ocean surface, the abyssal ooze of the CCZ holds trillions of polymetallic nodules — potato-sized deposits loaded with copper, nickel, manganese and other precious ores."
21-7-1
First seabed mines may be step closer to reality:
The tiny Pacific nation of Nauru has created shockwaves by demanding that the rules for deep sea mining are agreed in the next two years. Environmental groups warn that [regulations concerning seabed mining] will lead to a destructive rush on the mineral-rich seabed "nodules" that are sought by the mining companies. But United Nations officials overseeing deep sea mining say no venture underwater can start for years.
[Partnered with DeepGreen], Nauru, an island state in the Pacific Ocean, has called on the
International Seabed Authority - a UN body that oversees the ocean floor - to
speed up the regulations that will govern deep sea mining. Nauru has activated a
seemingly obscure sub-clause in the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea that
allows countries to pull a 'two-year trigger' if they feel negotiations are going too slowly. Nauru, which is partnered with a mining company, DeepGreen, argues that it has "a duty to the international community" to make this move to help achieve "regulatory certainty". It says that it stands to lose most from climate change so it wants to encourage access to the small rocks known as nodules that lie on the sea bed.
[The nodules] are rich in cobalt and other valuable metals that could be useful for batteries and renewable energy systems in the transition away from fossil fuels. The nodules, a habitat for countless forms of life, are estimated to have formed over several million years so any recovery from mining will be incredibly slow. Scientists say they're far from gaining a complete understanding of the ecosystems in the abyssal plains - but already know they're far more vibrant and complex than previously thought.
Still unknown are the impacts of giant machines' stirring up plumes of sediment that are likely to drift over vast distances underwater. Researching this question is a difficult and slow task - and is unlikely to be fully answered within the two-year period initiated by Nauru.
