Source: NZ Herald
The potential environmental impacts of controversial deep-sea mining will be investigated in a new multi-million dollar study.
A new $3.7 million study will assess potential impacts on seafloor life from proposed seabed mining operations. Photo: FileDr Malcolm Clark, a fisheries scientists at the National Institute of Water and Atmosphere (Niwa), said a lack of knowledge about life on the seafloor and how it could be affected had been one of the major factors that led the Environmental Protection Authority to refuse the two off-shore mining applications lodged so far.
There were particular concerns around impacts from sediment plumes, created by disturbance to the seafloor and mining operations discharging the processed water back into the ocean.
Clark is now leading a $3.7 million programme to tackle the questions.
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