Source: Salon
Author: Ashley Marranzino
There is an adage among miners: if it can’t be grown, it must be mined.
Almost everything we use relies on mining. Phones and computers contain elements like aluminum, nickel, and lithium. Plastic is made from petroleum products extracted from fossil fuels in the ground. Even your toothpaste is chock full of mined materials.
The growing human population places an increasing demand on the non-renewable resources that come from Earth’s crust. Technological advances and the search for renewable energy sources could exacerbate the situation. As our terrestrial mineral resources diminish, governments, researchers, and corporations have proposed searching for resources in a new location: thousands of meters beneath the surface of the ocean.
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