Source: Sputnik News
The International Seabed Authority is drawing up new rules on the exploitation of the seabed by deep sea mining companies. Sputnik spoke to Ann Dom, Deputy Director of Seas At Risk, and two deep sea mining companies about the risks of trawling for metals on the ocean floor.
Global demand for cobalt, copper, nickel and manganese is booming as they are required in the production of electric batteries and clean energy technology and companies are now looking at the ocean as a possible source of these minerals.
Gerald Barron, CEO of Deep Green, one of the companies involved in deep sea mining, said he believed getting battery metals from polymetallic nodules on the ocean floor was “the best shot we have to supply the transition away from fossil fuels in a way that does not make climate change worse.”
But Ann Dom, Deputy of Director of the Brussels-based charity Seas At Risk, said deep sea mining was unnecessary and the consequences for mankind and for the planet were incalculable.
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