To mine or not to mine – the moral dilemma of deep sea mining

Peter Harris

By GRID-Arendal

June 12^th, 2019

The annual deep sea mining summit was held in London recently on April 29-30. Their web page begins with this sentence: “As we move into an era of mining the deep-ocean floor, the world’s most remote environment, mining companies are working on overcoming the perceived challenges…” Reading this sentence it seems as though the decision to mine the ocean floor has already been taken, even though there is not currently any deep sea mining underway anywhere. In fact, one of the leading companies in the deep sea mining business, Nautilus Minerals, was delisted from the Toronto stock exchange while four of its five directors resigned amidst a company financial crisis.

In spite of such setbacks, there remains a stoic optimism in the pro-mining community that it is only a matter of time before deep sea mining gets started somewhere. A seminar was held in Norway at the Ministry of Petroleum and Energy last week to consider mining within the exclusive economic zone. Perhaps it is worth reminding ourselves of the environmental risks that this industry will face if it were to commence operations.

First, it must be remembered that deep sea mining, like all mining, is unsustainable. Mining is the process of extracting a non-renewable resource from the earth; hence it is not logical to discuss the “sustainable extraction of subsea minerals”. There is also a moral dimension to the mining of any non-renewable resource since once it has been mined it will not be available for future generations. Our hopes of eventually attaining the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) depend upon the present generation taking into account the needs of future generations and the condition of the world that they will inherit from us. To attain the SDGs we must avoid increases in unsustainable industries and growth-based economic models and expand industries based on renewable resources and circular economic models.

Regarding the potential environmental impacts that deep sea mining would have if it were to take place, the scientific community has already expressed grave reservations. Mining will not only remove the substrate where the mining occurs, it will generate plumes of suspended sediment that could potentially travel for 10’s or 100’s of km smothering filter-feeding benthos and releasing toxic chemicals that are intolerable to life; these potential impacts are poorly understood. One report authored by 15 ocean experts has cautioned that deep sea mining could lead to a loss of biodiversity in the ocean - there is a risk of extinction of species unknown to science.

Yes, it is technologically possible to mine the ocean floor, but should we do it? Is it worth the risk to the unseen and unknown animal life and the possible extinction of species? The resources are non-renewable, meaning that once extracted they are gone forever. What is the risk to valuable (renewable) fisheries? What about our obligations to future generations? Deep sea mining falls into the category of questionable human uses of the oceans that will no doubt be debated over years to come.