Deep sea mining

[potatolord]

There are proposals to mine the deep sea bed for various minerals. Exploration license have been granted. There is a wiki article on deep sea mining here:

Deep sea mining - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Much will be carried out in international waters, and oversight will be difficult owing to the difficulties of monitoring.

Personally, I think this will be a free for all, with little understanding of the long-term impact. I think there should be a long moratorium while research is carried out.

Any views?

 

[potatolord]

It's being blown out of proportion as usual. A few companies mining the seabed is not going to destroy the planet, even if something bad happens. Just need to introduce some regulations and monitoring rather than it being a free for all (which is already the case as licences have to be issued). The chance of anything serious happening is probably similar to being struck by a whopping asteroid.

The issue is that the impact is unknown. There is no precedent, and little evidence. It may fatally damage food chains in the oceans. It may release large volumes of toxic chemicals. No-one knows.

As it is carried out at considerable depth, monitoring will be difficult, at best. Regulation is entirely new in this area, complicated by this being international waters. Both will be an extremely expensive undertaking, complicated by this being international waters.

It will be a free for all, where the winner will be whoever does it fastest. There is therefore an incentive to do quick and dirty.