Renee Grogan is the cofounder and chief sustainability officer at Impossible Metals.
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The noise around carbon emissions reduction and the transition to a green economy is deafening, particularly as we observe the progress of COP27. As a result, it can be hard to get a feel for what is going well and what isn’t. Except when leaders from Pacific nations address COP standing in several feet of water that wasn’t there a few years ago—that seems to send a pretty clear message that whatever’s happening, it’s not really happening fast enough.
In the context of this busy and noisy space, deep-sea mining might be one of the biggest issues you’ve never heard about.
Deep-sea mining mostly relates to the mining of potato-sized rocks that sit on the seafloor at about 5,000 meters water depth, and hold vast quantities (comparatively much more than terrestrial mines) of metals like cobalt, copper and nickel—which are vital to building infrastructure associated with the “green transition”—wind turbines, electric vehicles and batteries.
Those in favor of DSM will tell you that the demands for key minerals such as cobalt, nickel and lithium are so high that they cannot be met by currently available terrestrial resources, and/or recycling streams—in other words, we cannot solve the climate crisis without them. That’s true. Proponents of DSM will also tell you that access to these metals on the seafloor would solve an impending geopolitical crisis associated with nondemocratic nations such as China and Russia controlling the supply of these metals, and effectively holding other countries to ransom for access to these incredibly critical supplies. That’s also true.
Those against DSM will tell you that proposals to vacuum up seabed rocks containing these metals would have dire environmental consequences, particularly on ecosystems that we currently know relatively little about. That’s also true.
I believe that dredging the seafloor is not the only option, and that responsible alternatives would turn the question from a “yes or no” debate into a “how to” debate.
Selective harvesting of the seafloor, when proven, will be more sustainable than every other form of mining—and could herald a general “raising of the bar” on sustainability issues for mining in general. And this is critical; the raising of the bar on ESG issues in the mining sector would benefit all users of metals—which is everyone—and would lead to a greater level of both scrutiny and transparency in an industry that has typically had a pretty poor ESG scorecard.
For, And Against
The implementation/adoption of selective harvesting will be a boon to our planet—supply the metals needed to transition to net-zero, offset the geopolitical risk associated with doing business with nondemocratic nations, and contribute to a step-change in ESG performance of the mining industry generally.
I’ve spent 17 years in the mining industry—which I joined as a young 20-something, passionate about conservation and wanting to “influence from the inside”—to turn the big, dirty ship that is the mining industry into a “force for good.” This isn’t Pollyanna territory. Sustainably harvesting the world’s critical metals is within reach—an outcome that would benefit the transition to a green economy.
We are seeing firsthand how technology and AI can enhance sustainability while providing the green economy with the critical metals it needs. Our selective harvesting technology joins a growing body of innovations in the metals and mining industry, including a range of technologies that decrease emissions and waste and improve efficiency, such as ore sorting, gathering metals from geothermal water, and recovering metals from mineral tailings ponds.
Like It Or Not, It’s A Consumer’s Choice
The Nation recently reported that there are limited options for the supply of critical metals for the green economy, and none of them are good. The article ended with the extremely depressing statement that “the true burden of … an electric car or truck will be borne … by the people and ecosystems unlucky enough to be in or near the global supply chain that will produce it.”
The reality is, vacuuming up the seafloor (and its metal resources) will have significant impacts on the environment. But that doesn’t mean the conversation ends there. Alternative harvesting techniques would leave the ecosystems intact and ensure the preservation of seafloor biodiversity. If this can be achieved, we may have a pathway to metal supplies that actually accelerates the transition to net-zero and addresses what seems to be the one consistent cry from COP27—that things aren’t happening fast enough.
To advance the net-zero journey, we need faster progress, and that includes having an open-minded view on issues (like DSM) that could, if implemented responsibly and robustly, be major contributors to the global journey to net-zero. And these need to be discussed in a pragmatic way.
If you made it this far into the article, you now know more about DSM than most people, and that’s also part of the solution—expanding the collective knowledge around choices that need to be made to support the transition to net-zero and the pathway to making those choices quickly, responsibly and transparently.
This is the economic battle for the ages, one that will only be solved by environmentalists, the mining industry and consumers coming together.
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