For the past few months, I have been reporting on the nascent deep-sea mining industry. Metals worth trillions of dollars lie at the bottom of the sea, and a handful of companies have been developing the technology to get them up to the surface and into electric car batteries, weapons systems and whatever else might need it.
The industry faces major hurdles to get off the ground. Environmentalists and some scientists are appalled at the idea of meddling with fragile ocean ecosystems. Plus, most of the metal is in international waters — ostensibly shared by all of humanity — and the international community has not agreed on rules for mining there.
Recently, however, the industry caught a break. Despite the protests of many nations, the United States may soon award the first permit for commercial mining in international waters. The move is of a piece with the Trump administration’s apparent lack of concern with violating the conventions of international cooperation.
Getting to the bottom of it
But if, for a minute, you can set aside the environmental and geopolitical concerns, what remains is a mind-blowing engineering challenge. The metal is miles below the ocean surface. At those depths, the world is utterly dark. The water pressure is hundreds of times greater than the air pressure at the surface. We have better maps of the dark side of the Moon than of the bottom of our oceans.
With my colleagues Sachi Kitajima Mulkey and Junho Lee, I set out to show how deep-sea mining could actually work. We contacted The Metals Company, a firm at the forefront of the deep-sea mining industry, and asked them to share a 3-D model of their equipment. To our mild surprise, they agreed. They even took the time to walk us through how it all works.
The result is an article we published today that focuses on a real test mission the company ran a few years ago. In the article, you follow one of the world’s first deep-sea mining ships to the Clarion-Clipperton Zone, a vast area of the Pacific Ocean between Mexico and Hawaii. From there, you travel from the surface to the bottom of the sea and back up again.
Along the way, you watch as a bus-sized mining robot is lowered from the side of the ship. You see how it deploys what amounts to a miles-long industrial straw to suck metal nodules off the seafloor. And you get a glimpse of the otherworldly creatures that live in the environment where the deep-sea mining industry wishes to operate.
What’s next?
If The Metals Company and its competitors can figure out how to turn a profit, deep-sea mining could grow. The industry says that, to the extent that deep-sea mining replaces land-based mining, with its track record of environmental degradation and worker abuses, the world would be better off.
Environmentalists don’t buy that argument, saying deep-sea mining would add to, rather than replace, land-based mining. In any case, even if U.S. regulators grant licenses this year, commercial mining is most likely still years in the future. (The Trump administration has argued that deep sea mining is allowed under a 1980 act by Congress and that the United States is not party to the international Law of the Sea.)
Still, a fleet of deep sea mining ships doesn’t yet exist, and few refineries have proven capable of turning the nodules into something usable. Environmental groups are expected to challenge any U.S. license in court, while future U.S. administrations could reverse support for the industry.
More climate news
E.U. steps up ocean monitoring as Trump administration backs away: Days after the Trump administration vowed to dismantle a deep-ocean observation system, the European Union said it would bolster its own monitoring of the world’s oceans.
Democrats, for their part, are vowing fight the removal of the ocean monitors: The system cost $368 million when it was installed in 2016 but now officials want to shut it down, which they say would save $48 million in operating costs each year.
Arizona and Nevada agree to trade for desalinated Pacific Ocean water: A novel agreement was reached on Wednesday to help mitigate water problems in the West. Under the deal, Arizona and Nevada will pay communities in Southern California to use water from desalination plants rather than the Colorado River. Then, those states will draw those communities’ share of Colorado River water for their own use.
An unusual Greenpeace lawsuit may proceed: A Dutch court ruled on Wednesday that Greenpeace International could proceed with its unusual countersuit against the pipeline company Energy Transfer in the Netherlands.
Climate science
Bright city lights might be making your allergies worse
New research shows that light pollution prompts plants to shed pollen longer, increases the growth of notoriously allergenic ragweed and makes our bodies more prone to allergic reactions, from runny noses to asthma.
The study, published in the journal PNAS Nexus, focused on the U.S. Northeast and found that trees in cities like New York City and Philadelphia start producing pollen earlier in the spring and finish later in the fall compared with places in the same region with low light pollution. The difference could add up to 130 days per year to the allergy season, the researchers found.
Light pollution is widespread: Almost 80 percent of North Americans can’t perceive the Milky Way because of sources like streetlights, car headlights and illuminated billboards. — Marta Zaraska
The climate quiz
What bird is in danger of leaving New York City?
These birds, about two feet tall, have been spotted in Harlem green spaces, along the East River in Queens and on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, where they are rumored to be aficionados of the local rats, Hilary Howard writes.
Still, the birds could vanish from New York City in 11 years, according to a new study. Scientists are trying to understand why, with possible factors including climate change and environmental toxins. These feathery creatures are considered an indicator species, which means that they fail to thrive when a pollutant or irritant is present, and some experts say they are “the canary in the coal mine” for biodiversity loss in the area.
More climate news from around the web:
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Spain recorded 101 heat-related deaths in May, Reuters reports, the highest figure for the month on record and 3.6 times the average for May this decade.
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China’s carbon dioxide emissions rose 2 percent in the first quarter, according to an analysis by Carbon Brief, driven by more coal use and higher amounts of “wasted” wind and solar power that wasn’t used by the grid.
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“Last year, global data centers used 448 trillion watt-hours of electricity, more than all but 10 countries of the world,” The Associated Press writes, citing a new United Nations report.
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