Deep Sea Mining Exposed: Inside the Fight to Save the Ocean's Last Frontier

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Is deep-sea mining sustainable?

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Not from an environmental impact,
I think we know the answer to that,

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but from an economical impact.

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Can people make money
from deep-sea mining?

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We're gonna talk about the environment,
the economics, all about deep-sea

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mining today, and we're gonna be talking
about the importance of the deep sea

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with my guest today, Matthew Gianni.

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He is the co-founder and political
and policy advisor for the Deep Sea

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Conservation Coalition out of Europe.

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He's here to talk to us about how he
got started in the environmental world,

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going from a deep sea trawling off
the coast of California, to landing a

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job at Greenpeace, to now co-founding
the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition,

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and working for over 30 years in
this business to be able to bring you

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some conservation of the deep sea.

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So we're gonna talk about the importance
of the deep sea, the environment,

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and what are the latest updates from
the International Seabed Authority

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meeting that just happened in July.

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It's the second meeting they do
of the two meetings this year.

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It was happening in Kingston, Jamaica,
and there's some really interesting

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things that came out of that meeting.

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So we're gonna talk about it
on today's episode of the How

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to Protect the Ocean podcast.

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So, you never know what you're
gonna get on these episodes.

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So stay tuned, follow, and
let's talk Matthew Gianni.

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Matthew was an amazing guest.

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He is a lot of fun to
be able to discuss it.

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It's the first time I've met
him, but having the conversation,

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I believe we could have talked
for three more hours at least.

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And we'll have him back on to talk more
updates on not only deep-sea mining,

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which is a big, big issue right now,
but also we're gonna talk about deep

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sea and why it's important, and all
the different animals that come out

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from there that we all love, and some
people call monsters, but I think call,

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like, aliens and cool things, and just
cool adaptations to the deep sea is

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what we're gonna see over the future.

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But deep-sea mining is right at the
forefront of a lot of news that's

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happening, not only from the International
Seabed Authority, which is the governing

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authority from the UN that looks after
setting the regulations of if deep-sea

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mining is actually gonna happen, whether
it's gonna happen, and we got some

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really interesting economic updates on
this, not only environmental updates,

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and also movement towards moratorium.

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So we're gonna hear that from Matthew.

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But also, like, we've seen a
big push from the US government,

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the Trump administration, that
wants to do deep-sea mining.

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We've talked about it
on the podcast before.

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There's been some public inquiries or
some public comment periods that have been

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ignored, and then the size of the area
that they're gonna mine or potentially

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mine have doubled, if not tripled.

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The metals companies involved.

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We're gonna talk all about that
today and how that's influencing

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deep-sea mining, and maybe it's
just not gonna happen at all.

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So, we're gonna hear that from Matthew.

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So here's the interview from
Matthew Gianni, co-founder and

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political and policy advisor for
the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition.

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Enjoy the interview, and
I'll talk to you after.

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Hey, Matthew.

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Welcome to the How to
Protect the Ocean podcast.

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Are you ready to talk about
deep sea conservation?

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Hi, Andrew.

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Yes, very much so.

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Thanks for having me on.

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You bet.

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I'm excited for this because,
uh, we're gonna be focusing

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a lot on the deep sea today.

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Obviously, you're from the Deep
Sea Conservation Coalition.

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We'll talk about that in a second.

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But we're gonna also talk about
some updates from the International

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Seabed Authority meeting that
happened in Kingston, Jamaica

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recently this, this past summer.

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Uh, and so we're gonna get an
update on where everything is at.

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Uh, but I-- what I really wanna focus
on too is, is obviously getting to

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know, uh, yourself, Matthew, but
also just what's in the deep sea.

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What can we expect?

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You've been working on this for
more than 20 years, uh, through the

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Deep Sea Conservation Coalition and,
and I s- I think a lot of, a lot

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of us really don't know what's down
there, and I think we think, a lot

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of us think it's like a barren sea.

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You know?

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Like, there's nothing down there
and there's nothing to worry about

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with whether you're extracting,
whether you're trawling, you know.

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These are things that we have to be
careful of and make sure that people know

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that it's, there's an abundant sea life.

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Maybe not as abundant as a coral reef,
but sometimes there are coral reefs.

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So we're gonna get into all of that
today, uh, and I'm excited to do so.

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But Matthew, before we get into
that, why don't you just let us

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know who you are and what you do?

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Well, I'm a co-founder of the
Deep Sea Conservation Coalition.

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It's a coalition of over 140
organizations, uh, looking at working, uh,

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of, including environmental organizations,
some human rights organizations, uh,

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coastal fishers organizations, and others,
uh, that are interested in conserving and

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protecting, uh, deep ocean ecosystems.

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Very nice.

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Very nice.

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Now, how did you get interested
and involved in just ocean

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conservation in general?

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Like, where did that begin?

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Well, it actually began when
I was working as a commercial

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fisherman, which I did for 10 years.

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Okay.

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Uh, including five years
as a deep sea trawler man.

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So we were fishing- Oh

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off the Central California coast at the
time, down to about 1,000 meters, which

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would be, uh, roughly 3,000 feet deep.

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Um, and, um, on the basis of that, I
ended up, uh, becoming an environmental

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activist, um, opposing offshore
oil development and a major dredge

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disposal project off the, uh, West
Coast of the United States, off

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the, off the San Francisco area.

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And eventually ended up going to
work for Greenpeace International-

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Hmm … uh, as it started up a
international fisheries campaign.

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And, um, worked through a number
of different campaigns, became

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involved in international policy
and, and, and treaty negotiations.

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Eventually ran the ocean program
for Greenpeace International,

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which is how I ended up here in
Amsterdam, where I'm currently based

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and have been for quite some time.

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Right.

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And then left Greenpeace in part to start
up a coalition, uh, to try and get an

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end to deep water trawling, primarily
on seamount ecosystems on the high seas

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through a UN general assembly process.

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And on the basis of that work,
eventually got into the issue of deep

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seabed mining So what made you go
from-- like, what was it that, that you

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wanted to do more about the deep sea
that you couldn't do at, at Greenpeace

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while managing the ocean program?

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I know they cover a lot
of different things.

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What made you wanna focus on
the deep sea in particular?

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Was it your history of doing
deep sea trawling in, in like,

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uh, when you were a fisher?

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Well, partly that.

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Um, uh, I did, uh, the deep sea trawling.

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It's actually a combination of shelf
and, and, and continental slope

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trawling, uh, for about five years.

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A highline vessel, we were the top vessel
off the Central California coast, probably

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one of the top 20 off the West Coast
of, uh, the US, excluding Alaska- Mm-hmm

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… in terms of sheer volume of production.

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But what, uh, amazed me, uh, often enough
was all of the stuff that we would bring

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up from the bottom in the net from the
deeper areas where we were trawling.

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Glass sponges, corals, uh,
all kinds of starfish, uh, uh,

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crabs, et cetera and so forth.

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Um, and most of which was
not commercially useful.

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Um- Mm-hmm … it wasn't, uh… It was, it
was stuff we would bring up off the bottom

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and then just shovel back over the side
after we picked- Huh … out the fish that

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we would, uh, take back into port to sell.

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Uh, but I think what really got me into
the deep sea, uh, uh, issue was… A- and

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Greenpeace came along with me on this.

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You know, we- Of course … we,
it was a small group of, of, of

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organizations that actually started
the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition.

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But what got me was, um, as I was kinda
campaigning on sustainable fisheries

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with Greenpeace and so forth, I sat in
on a, on a, um, a series of debates,

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uh, about whether, uh, uh, fishing,
commercial fishing in this case, could

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drive species biologically extinct.

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Hmm.

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And the general view was, or conclusion
of these discussions, mostly with

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scientists, was that yes, fisheries
can drive species commercially extinct.

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In other words, take the populations
of commercially valuable fish down

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to a level at which it's no longer
economical to, to continue fishing them.

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They could, uh, drive
species ecologically extinct.

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In other words, species, uh, that
would be depleted to such an extent

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that it would no longer occupy the
same role in the, in the ecosystem-

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Mm-hmm … but not biologically extinct.

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Uh, yes, a few marine mammals, uh,
had documented, you know, there

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were documented extinctions of,
uh, I think it was the Steller's

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sea cow in the North- Mm-hmm

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Pacific and a, and a few other animals,
but not fish and other species.

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And then in the late 1990s and the
early 2000s, '99, 2000, 2001, I became

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aware of studies coming out of the
South Pacific, uh, Tony Coslow and Karen

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Garrett-Holmes, I think, um, Bernard
Richard de Fourchet, that were-- had

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looked at bottom trawling on seamounts.

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Right.

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Uh, and in particular, a study that,
uh, Garrett-Holmes and, uh, Coslow

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had, uh, had, uh, been involved
in, where they looked at, at, at

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four seamounts off Tasmania that
are roughly 1,000 meters in depth.

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The peaks were about 1,000
meters below the surface.

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Two had been trawled, two had
not been trawled, and they

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did visual surveys of the two.

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The two that, uh, the, of the, all
four of them, and they found that

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the ones that hadn't been trawled
were teeming with coral cover on the

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upper- Right … slopes of the peaks.

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But the ones that were, had been trawled,
and one of these seamounts had been

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trawled 600 times and another had been
trawled 3,000 times, fishing for a

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type of fish called orange roughy, and
this was documented by the Australian

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Fisheries Management Authority.

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Yep.

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Um, they estimated that between 95%
and 98% of the, of the coral cover on

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those seamounts had been- G- were gone.

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They had been- Yeah … destroyed.

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Just been gutted.

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It was rubble.

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Yeah.

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And that coupled with Bernard
Richard Forges' study, which he was

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identifying relatively high degrees
of endemism in seamount ecosystems.

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Mm-hmm.

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And so the conclusion that I took from
that was, well, wait a minute now,

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it is possible if there are endemic
species on these seamounts and they're

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trawled as heavily as they were,
uh, uh, the ones off Aus- off, off

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Australia, which in fact is the case in
many parts of the world- Yeah … then

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they could be driving species extinct.

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Yeah.

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And in fact, uh, i- including species,
uh, that, uh, had not yet been discovered

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by science or was not yet- Mm-hmm
… that were not yet known to science.

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And this is something that I subsequently
heard Fred Grassle say from Rutgers

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University, a well-known deep sea
biologist, mostly, uh, uh, um, studying

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sediments in the deep ocean, where
he basically said, I think it was

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in 1992, he said, "We may be losing
species on seamounts from bottom,

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uh, because of bottom trawling that
we haven't even yet discovered."

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And so I thought, I mean,
for me it was twofold.

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One was, this is an outrage and we
should do something to try to stop this.

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Yeah.

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And number two, the, the, the, the fact
was that at the time, at least on the

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fisheries on the high seas, uh, the
countries that were allowing their vessels

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to go out and do this were the champions
of, of high seas fisheries sustainability.

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Countries like Australia, New
Zealand, the European Union, and,

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and a number of countries from the
European Union, Norway, et cetera.

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They were all trawling on
these areas on the high seas.

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And I thought, you know, and,
and this is against the law.

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I had been involved in treaty negotiations
in the mid-1990s, which should have put an

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end to this type of fishing, but didn't.

223
00:11:09,886 --> 00:11:13,736
Uh, and so decided together with
colleagues, let's take this campaign

224
00:11:13,776 --> 00:11:17,045
to the United Nations General Assembly
and see if we can get them to basically

225
00:11:17,046 --> 00:11:20,126
force these countries to have to
reconsider what they're doing and

226
00:11:20,126 --> 00:11:22,115
ultimately stop the, stop the damage.

227
00:11:22,605 --> 00:11:22,825
Yeah.

228
00:11:22,826 --> 00:11:25,145
And it's, it's really interesting
too, 'cause seamounts, from my

229
00:11:25,146 --> 00:11:29,485
understanding, are like a, a
high biodiverse area in general.

230
00:11:29,486 --> 00:11:33,516
And to, to see the studies where they
compare the two seamounts and understand

231
00:11:33,516 --> 00:11:36,846
that there are species that, like you
said, we haven't even, probably haven't

232
00:11:36,846 --> 00:11:41,085
even discovered yet or, or endemic that we
know they're endemic to these seamounts,

233
00:11:41,625 --> 00:11:44,705
could be gone and we could be losing
these species at a rate that we just

234
00:11:44,705 --> 00:11:49,266
don't, we can't, we can't even fathom
at this point, because a lot of times,

235
00:11:49,546 --> 00:11:52,345
uh, whether they're in the boundaries
of the EEZ or outside the boundaries

236
00:11:52,345 --> 00:11:56,235
in the high seas, there's just not
enough monitoring programs to, to, to

237
00:11:56,316 --> 00:11:58,105
monitor all these, all these seamounts.

238
00:11:58,605 --> 00:12:02,426
Well, that and, and not enough baseline
information in the first place- Yeah.

239
00:12:02,605 --> 00:12:05,835
Exactly … in order to realize what
you've lost, uh, because you've studied it

240
00:12:05,835 --> 00:12:07,885
before, before it was actually exploited.

241
00:12:08,146 --> 00:12:08,166
Yeah.

242
00:12:08,396 --> 00:12:13,146
And, you know, the same is true in, in
many cases, uh, of, of deep seabed mining.

243
00:12:13,816 --> 00:12:18,945
It's not yet taken hold, but similar
types of, of issues there, where the

244
00:12:18,955 --> 00:12:23,945
baseline information is so thin and
all of the other sorts of information

245
00:12:23,945 --> 00:12:27,205
you need to understand what the
impact of deep seabed mining will be.

246
00:12:27,725 --> 00:12:31,685
Connectivity among species, uh,
the structure of ecosystems, the

247
00:12:31,685 --> 00:12:34,915
life history characteristics of,
of, of species in the deep sea.

248
00:12:35,195 --> 00:12:36,575
How, how long do they live?

249
00:12:36,856 --> 00:12:37,136
Yeah.

250
00:12:37,136 --> 00:12:38,286
How do they reproduce?

251
00:12:38,615 --> 00:12:39,005
Right.

252
00:12:39,125 --> 00:12:42,866
What do they look like when they're young,
you know, in the, in the larvae form?

253
00:12:43,005 --> 00:12:47,335
What are their vulnerabilities to, uh,
heavy metals that might be released into

254
00:12:47,335 --> 00:12:49,166
the environment from deep seabed mining?

255
00:12:49,545 --> 00:12:53,665
Or noise and light, um, in
areas where there is none.

256
00:12:53,875 --> 00:12:56,675
Um- Mm-hmm … and you think of,
for example, these extraordinary

257
00:12:56,676 --> 00:13:01,125
creatures that live in the water
column 2 m- 2,000, 3,000, 4,000

258
00:13:01,136 --> 00:13:04,095
meters depth that are bioluminescent.

259
00:13:04,316 --> 00:13:04,665
You know?

260
00:13:05,275 --> 00:13:05,295
Yeah.

261
00:13:05,305 --> 00:13:09,195
They, they, they generate light in
order to attract prey, to attract

262
00:13:09,205 --> 00:13:14,035
m- uh, uh, uh, mates, to find, you
know, others of their species to…

263
00:13:14,116 --> 00:13:15,146
et cetera and so forth.

264
00:13:15,185 --> 00:13:18,615
And then if you start shining a lot
of light on them, these species, it's,

265
00:13:18,615 --> 00:13:22,506
it's, it could impact their, you know,
their, their, their, their viability.

266
00:13:23,006 --> 00:13:23,346
Yeah.

267
00:13:23,375 --> 00:13:24,276
No, absolutely.

268
00:13:24,625 --> 00:13:32,250
Um, there's, there seems to be, uh, like
a, a obviously, uh A focus right now

269
00:13:32,250 --> 00:13:34,910
on, on the deep sea, right, these days.

270
00:13:35,359 --> 00:13:38,910
And, and that deep sea is more
around, you kind of mentioned

271
00:13:38,910 --> 00:13:40,319
a little bit, deep sea mining.

272
00:13:41,000 --> 00:13:47,819
And before we get into sort of the,
the nuances of deep sea mining, you

273
00:13:47,819 --> 00:13:51,939
know, there, there's been this talk
of, of, of that there's really not,

274
00:13:51,959 --> 00:13:53,379
not really that much on the bottom.

275
00:13:53,729 --> 00:13:56,769
You know, there's- … you know,
there's not much geomorphology.

276
00:13:56,769 --> 00:13:57,479
It's just sand.

277
00:13:57,479 --> 00:14:00,019
There might be some worms,
you know, that kind of stuff.

278
00:14:00,239 --> 00:14:00,280
Yeah.

279
00:14:00,409 --> 00:14:03,250
Uh, we know that's not true,
right, from, from a lot of the

280
00:14:03,250 --> 00:14:04,400
exploration that's been done.

281
00:14:04,659 --> 00:14:08,499
But we also know that very little of
the deep sea compared to the, it's

282
00:14:08,499 --> 00:14:12,539
all of its surface area has actually
been, um, you know, been monitored,

283
00:14:12,549 --> 00:14:16,159
including like the, in the water
column of the deep part of the sea, you

284
00:14:16,159 --> 00:14:17,969
know, not just the, the, the bottom.

285
00:14:18,469 --> 00:14:23,942
Um- Oh, how can you explain, when, when
somebody comes to you and, and then

286
00:14:23,952 --> 00:14:26,911
they may not know much about the deep
sea and they're interested and they ask

287
00:14:26,911 --> 00:14:32,101
you like, "Why should we care about the
deep sea?" What answer do you give them?

288
00:14:32,812 --> 00:14:34,091
I know it's a general question.

289
00:14:34,092 --> 00:14:37,231
There's probably a lot that you could go
into, but what's the general answer that

290
00:14:37,232 --> 00:14:38,862
you pretty much give in that respect?

291
00:14:39,732 --> 00:14:45,671
Well, I, for me it's, you, you can
come at it from different angles

292
00:14:45,671 --> 00:14:50,621
and sometimes, you know, I tr- I try
to a- a- adapt a response to what I

293
00:14:50,671 --> 00:14:53,521
understand to be the interest of the
person that's asking the question.

294
00:14:53,522 --> 00:14:53,761
Of course.

295
00:14:53,851 --> 00:14:59,591
But basically, um, one of the key issues
for me at least, um, that, that, that

296
00:14:59,621 --> 00:15:03,602
frankly astounds me is that we're in
a, and I hate to use the word crisis.

297
00:15:03,602 --> 00:15:05,871
I mean, it's crisis, crisis,
crisis everywhere you look.

298
00:15:05,881 --> 00:15:06,002
Mm-hmm.

299
00:15:06,002 --> 00:15:07,492
You know, especially in the newspapers.

300
00:15:07,741 --> 00:15:08,041
Yeah.

301
00:15:08,081 --> 00:15:12,622
But, you know, even the G7 countries
have put out communiques saying

302
00:15:12,622 --> 00:15:14,161
we have a biodiversity crisis.

303
00:15:14,161 --> 00:15:17,751
We have a triple planetary crisis
of, of biodiversity loss, climate

304
00:15:17,752 --> 00:15:19,641
change, and marine pollution.

305
00:15:20,081 --> 00:15:20,311
Yeah.

306
00:15:20,322 --> 00:15:21,551
Uh, sorry, pollution generally.

307
00:15:21,732 --> 00:15:21,942
Yeah.

308
00:15:22,151 --> 00:15:27,012
Uh, and, and when you think about how much
has been lost, I mean- Mm-hmm … there

309
00:15:27,012 --> 00:15:32,851
are, there are scientists who basically
say we are arguably living through a

310
00:15:32,861 --> 00:15:36,381
sixth mass extinction event on the planet.

311
00:15:36,581 --> 00:15:42,021
Um, the first being, uh, the… Now
I should know this, uh, actually.

312
00:15:42,062 --> 00:15:45,262
I mean, the most famous extinction
was roughly 65 million years

313
00:15:45,262 --> 00:15:46,402
ago is when the dinosaurs- Yeah

314
00:15:46,412 --> 00:15:46,921
went extinct.

315
00:15:46,941 --> 00:15:50,051
But before that there was the Permian,
there was the End Triassic, and then

316
00:15:50,051 --> 00:15:54,051
there were the, it was the, uh, I think
it was the End-Or- D- O- Ordovician,

317
00:15:54,181 --> 00:15:55,912
uh- Right … mass extinction events.

318
00:15:56,541 --> 00:16:01,472
And this one is being caused by
us, the humans on the planet.

319
00:16:02,291 --> 00:16:07,751
And I just think that why would
we go into a whole new frontier of

320
00:16:07,751 --> 00:16:13,732
the planet and risk destroying so
much for so little in return, i.e.,

321
00:16:14,111 --> 00:16:18,941
uh, a handful, well, relatively
small amounts of metals that you can

322
00:16:18,941 --> 00:16:22,291
get from deep sea bed mining based
on all the information we have now.

323
00:16:22,711 --> 00:16:29,901
Um, uh, a- and, and, and, and lose,
uh, you know, r- put, put a whole

324
00:16:29,911 --> 00:16:34,832
new frontier of, of, of the Earth
that has been largely untouched, uh,

325
00:16:34,851 --> 00:16:37,101
at risk of a mass extinction event.

326
00:16:37,824 --> 00:16:39,284
Uh, so that's one way to answer it.

327
00:16:39,284 --> 00:16:40,414
But the other-- there are others.

328
00:16:40,434 --> 00:16:45,044
There are, you know, for example, um,
the deep ocean, uh, according to, for

329
00:16:45,044 --> 00:16:49,654
example, the UN's World Ocean Assessment,
uh, drives planetary processes.

330
00:16:49,743 --> 00:16:55,194
Um- Mm-hmm … uh, it, uh, and, and,
and we don't understand fully how that

331
00:16:55,194 --> 00:16:56,824
works, what those connections are.

332
00:16:57,723 --> 00:17:02,234
But if we start messing with the deep
sea, we might, uh, end up with a whole

333
00:17:02,234 --> 00:17:03,934
range of unintended consequences.

334
00:17:03,934 --> 00:17:07,464
The most important- Yeah … of
course, is the ocean, as we know,

335
00:17:07,523 --> 00:17:11,283
is the world's-- is, is by far
the largest natural carbon sink.

336
00:17:11,884 --> 00:17:12,104
Yes.

337
00:17:12,114 --> 00:17:15,443
Um, something like 25% of the
greenhouse gases that we pump into

338
00:17:15,443 --> 00:17:18,883
the atmosphere get absorbed, the
CO2 gets absorbed in the ocean.

339
00:17:19,333 --> 00:17:23,953
Without that natural buffer, we
would be in serious trouble today.

340
00:17:23,954 --> 00:17:27,814
We're already heading in toward, you know,
serious- Mm-hmm … difficult territory.

341
00:17:28,483 --> 00:17:34,053
And there are some, uh, real concerns
that, uh, deep seabed mining could somehow

342
00:17:34,073 --> 00:17:39,234
diminish or, uh, the, the, the capacity
of the oceans to absorb CO2, maybe in

343
00:17:39,234 --> 00:17:41,423
small may- ways, maybe in bigger ways.

344
00:17:41,884 --> 00:17:42,873
Uh, we don't know.

345
00:17:42,913 --> 00:17:47,014
And, uh, my understanding of that
concern lies mostly in relation to

346
00:17:47,014 --> 00:17:51,394
the mesopelagic zone, which is one of
the main vectors for taking carbon out

347
00:17:51,524 --> 00:17:56,843
of the surface waters and basically
sequestering it for large peri- long

348
00:17:56,844 --> 00:17:58,474
periods of time into the deep sea.

349
00:17:58,753 --> 00:17:58,953
Right.

350
00:17:58,954 --> 00:18:03,123
And the, the plume flows that would be
generated, the discharge flows that would

351
00:18:03,134 --> 00:18:06,843
be generated from the mining ships on
the surface bringing up this material

352
00:18:06,844 --> 00:18:11,973
from the bottom and then dumping out the
wastewater and the excess, uh, uh, bits

353
00:18:11,983 --> 00:18:16,364
and pieces of the so-called mining fines,
uh, as well as the sediment that would

354
00:18:16,364 --> 00:18:21,593
come up with that, um, could impact,
uh, the, the capacity of the mesopelagic

355
00:18:21,594 --> 00:18:25,603
zone to basically get that carbon out
of surface waters, get it down below

356
00:18:25,603 --> 00:18:30,653
the 1,000 to 2,000-meter depth range,
and basically lock it away for- Mm-hmm

357
00:18:30,683 --> 00:18:34,043
uh, a, a few hundred, uh,
centuries to thousands of years.

358
00:18:34,634 --> 00:18:36,533
And so there is a concern.

359
00:18:36,873 --> 00:18:39,293
The other thing is, you know, there's,
there's, there's so much we, we, we

360
00:18:39,293 --> 00:18:40,383
still don't know about the deep sea.

361
00:18:40,384 --> 00:18:43,933
I mean, you probably heard,
uh, this was back in, uh, 2024.

362
00:18:43,933 --> 00:18:45,883
I, I, I worked with this
guy, Andrew Sweetman.

363
00:18:45,883 --> 00:18:46,443
Mm-hmm.

364
00:18:46,443 --> 00:18:48,813
Discovery of, of, of dark oxygen.

365
00:18:48,964 --> 00:18:49,264
Yes.

366
00:18:49,693 --> 00:18:54,593
That the manganese nodules, which
is the primary ore of interest to

367
00:18:54,593 --> 00:18:56,043
the deep seabed mining industry.

368
00:18:56,373 --> 00:18:56,623
Right.

369
00:18:56,673 --> 00:19:01,153
Um, and these lie on the deep abyssal
plains, which in fact aren't quite plains.

370
00:19:01,153 --> 00:19:03,974
They are-- There's, there's quite
a range of topography down there.

371
00:19:04,553 --> 00:19:09,054
Um, these are areas of the oceans that
sit at 5,000, 6,000, 7,000 meters depth,

372
00:19:09,524 --> 00:19:14,653
um, all the way down at, at the bottom
end of the so-called continental slopes.

373
00:19:15,303 --> 00:19:25,814
And, um, his-- he's basically found that,
uh, the, the nodules might be producing

374
00:19:25,873 --> 00:19:33,522
oxygen Um, and the not clear how this, is
it microbial activity on these nodules?

375
00:19:33,522 --> 00:19:37,162
Is it, uh, uh, electrolysis, I think
it is, you know, where it's breaking

376
00:19:37,172 --> 00:19:41,642
hydrogen and oxygen, H2O, you know,
water into hydrogen and oxygen.

377
00:19:42,151 --> 00:19:47,092
Um, he still has to ground truth or,
or again, kind of verify to repeat the,

378
00:19:47,092 --> 00:19:51,001
uh, the experiment, uh, or the, the,
the, the finding, which he's now in the

379
00:19:51,002 --> 00:19:53,012
process of doing with his colleagues.

380
00:19:53,092 --> 00:20:00,701
Um, and, um, and the question is, is this
really a s- i- is this actually occurring?

381
00:20:00,702 --> 00:20:05,502
And if so, does this oxygen production
in the deep ocean actually, is

382
00:20:05,502 --> 00:20:07,892
it important to the functioning-
Yeah … of those ecosystems?

383
00:20:08,132 --> 00:20:08,152
Yeah.

384
00:20:08,502 --> 00:20:11,771
And to me, again, the extraordinary
thing here is, you know, we've been--

385
00:20:11,801 --> 00:20:15,472
the, the, the mining industry has been
interested in mining these nodules.

386
00:20:15,522 --> 00:20:19,871
This is primarily in the Eastern Pacific,
uh, just north of the equator, up to

387
00:20:19,871 --> 00:20:26,362
about 20 or 30 degrees north, uh, a huge
area of about, uh, 1.7 million square

388
00:20:26,362 --> 00:20:29,151
miles, 4.5 million square kilometers.

389
00:20:29,761 --> 00:20:32,311
The bottom is littered
with, with these nodules.

390
00:20:32,871 --> 00:20:36,801
Um, but the extraordinary thing is
that, that the, that the mining industry

391
00:20:36,801 --> 00:20:40,831
or the proto-mining industry has been
looking at this area for over 50 years.

392
00:20:41,082 --> 00:20:43,541
You know, there were, there were
companies out there poking around

393
00:20:43,542 --> 00:20:44,941
down there in the '60s, early '70s.

394
00:20:44,941 --> 00:20:48,482
Nodules were actually discovered
by the Challenger expedition in-

395
00:20:48,482 --> 00:20:50,282
Right … in 1974, I believe it was.

396
00:20:50,871 --> 00:20:56,441
Um, and only now we're starting to see
things like something that could be such

397
00:20:56,441 --> 00:21:03,341
a huge, uh, uh, element of the ecology
and the, and the, and the biology, uh,

398
00:21:03,402 --> 00:21:08,141
of, of that area, uh, only, only now
being, being potentially discovered.

399
00:21:08,241 --> 00:21:09,331
And again, Andrew's clear.

400
00:21:09,332 --> 00:21:11,661
He says, "I'm, I'm convinced
this is deep oxygen.

401
00:21:12,141 --> 00:21:14,181
I've gone through these,
these experiments.

402
00:21:14,182 --> 00:21:15,682
I've, I've looked at the machinery.

403
00:21:15,682 --> 00:21:20,691
It's 10 years, uh, and I'm convinced."
But he recognizes he needs to repeat

404
00:21:21,311 --> 00:21:25,731
the ex- the, the, the, the finding, the
experiments- Yeah … to, to see if that's

405
00:21:25,731 --> 00:21:31,122
happening, and then look at the potential
for what role that that oxygen plays i-

406
00:21:31,131 --> 00:21:33,602
in, in, in the deep ocean ecosystems.

407
00:21:33,691 --> 00:21:36,151
So again- So is he doing that, is
he doing that now, like currently?

408
00:21:36,152 --> 00:21:39,048
That's, that's the experiment that
he's, he's doing now or- Yeah, I don't-

409
00:21:39,048 --> 00:21:41,311
… when is it gonna- … I don't know if
he's-- I think he's going out soon.

410
00:21:41,542 --> 00:21:43,411
Um- Yeah … I'm not sure he's out yet.

411
00:21:43,461 --> 00:21:47,081
Uh, he's got a grant from the Nippon
Foundation in, uh, Japan- Right

412
00:21:47,092 --> 00:21:47,851
to go out and look at it.

413
00:21:47,851 --> 00:21:47,881
To explore it.

414
00:21:47,881 --> 00:21:51,941
And interestingly, the Ni- the
Nippon Foundation was kind of, uh,

415
00:21:52,021 --> 00:21:56,542
interested in actually mining nodules
themselves- Mm … in Japanese waters.

416
00:21:56,611 --> 00:22:02,371
Um, but apparently have taken a step back,
uh, in part because of Andrew's discovery

417
00:22:02,451 --> 00:22:06,311
and thinking, "Okay, we, we maybe we need
to know a lot more about what's going

418
00:22:06,311 --> 00:22:10,791
on down there before we start, you know,
exploiting these ecosystems to, uh, to

419
00:22:10,792 --> 00:22:13,592
the detriment of, of basically the- Right

420
00:22:13,592 --> 00:22:18,471
the, the ecology of these areas and to,
to us as humankind if this, uh, mining

421
00:22:18,471 --> 00:22:22,632
industry takes off, uh, on a large scale."
And the interesting things too is you,

422
00:22:22,632 --> 00:22:27,012
I'm sure you're aware of this, but um-
Scientists have said, and I'm thinking

423
00:22:27,012 --> 00:22:31,462
of a piece that was done by Stephanie
Kaiser, uh, Craig Smith from University

424
00:22:31,462 --> 00:22:36,231
of Hawaii, and Pedro Martinez, uh, in a
special issue of, uh, Marine Biodiversity

425
00:22:36,242 --> 00:22:42,332
that ran in 2017, but they basically say
up to half of the larger animals, uh,

426
00:22:42,342 --> 00:22:46,532
in the deep ocean, the meta- the, the
megafauna, the, the, the macrofauna, the

427
00:22:46,532 --> 00:22:51,121
metazoan species, are nodule-obligate
species, which means they actually

428
00:22:51,121 --> 00:22:57,222
depend on the nodules, um, uh, for,
for some portion of their life history.

429
00:22:57,641 --> 00:23:02,021
Uh, and when you remove them, they
say it will probably be a, a, it

430
00:23:02,082 --> 00:23:05,601
could take millions of years for
these animals to come back in these

431
00:23:06,032 --> 00:23:08,671
ecosystems because it takes millions
of years for these nodules to grow.

432
00:23:09,032 --> 00:23:09,382
Yeah.

433
00:23:09,431 --> 00:23:12,932
And so you're not just plucking
rocks off the bottom, you're actually

434
00:23:13,071 --> 00:23:16,992
plucking a living ecosystem with
each nodule you bring up, uh, for

435
00:23:17,001 --> 00:23:20,072
about half of the species, at least
the larger species, the more complex

436
00:23:20,072 --> 00:23:21,971
animals that live in the deep ocean.

437
00:23:22,041 --> 00:23:26,301
And, and it's something that I think you
alluded to earlier, the extraordinary

438
00:23:26,341 --> 00:23:31,741
diversity of species in the deep sea is,
is, is, is, is, is i- in many respects

439
00:23:31,912 --> 00:23:37,282
a, a new discovery only over the last
20 years or so, um, primarily because of

440
00:23:37,282 --> 00:23:39,801
interest in mining and mining the nodules.

441
00:23:40,101 --> 00:23:44,661
Um, uh, the International Seabed
Authority, which regulates mining in

442
00:23:44,662 --> 00:23:49,821
the international areas of the world's
ocean, which is about roughly 50 to 75%

443
00:23:49,821 --> 00:23:54,811
of the, uh, well, uh, half to two-thirds
of the overall seabed of the oceans- Yeah

444
00:23:54,891 --> 00:24:01,221
um, uh, requires two things of a
company or a country that wants to get

445
00:24:01,221 --> 00:24:08,071
a contract to explore for the mining,
uh, potential, mining opportunities.

446
00:24:08,181 --> 00:24:08,671
Mm-hmm.

447
00:24:08,681 --> 00:24:12,561
Uh, the first, they have to, uh, assess
the area, the claim area that they

448
00:24:12,561 --> 00:24:16,431
get- Yep … uh, issued through, by,
you know, through a contract from the

449
00:24:16,442 --> 00:24:20,971
International Seabed Authority, assess
the potential of the, of the, the metals

450
00:24:20,981 --> 00:24:23,371
or the mineral grades in, in those areas.

451
00:24:23,431 --> 00:24:26,491
And the second is that they have
to collect environmental baseline

452
00:24:26,491 --> 00:24:30,961
information, uh, in order to produce an
environmental impact assessment if they

453
00:24:30,961 --> 00:24:35,211
want to decide to go from exploration
to full-scale commercial mining.

454
00:24:35,391 --> 00:24:38,061
And that's for making sure that
they are not going to impact the

455
00:24:38,061 --> 00:24:41,011
environment in and around the area
that they're gonna be in, right?

456
00:24:41,371 --> 00:24:41,571
That they're gonna work in.

457
00:24:41,571 --> 00:24:42,571
Basically, yeah.

458
00:24:42,641 --> 00:24:43,051
Yeah.

459
00:24:43,111 --> 00:24:46,832
And some of the best information,
ironically, has come from,

460
00:24:47,332 --> 00:24:49,461
uh, the, the, the contractors.

461
00:24:49,662 --> 00:24:49,872
Yeah.

462
00:24:49,872 --> 00:24:52,222
Um, so I mean, there is, there is,
there is quite a bit of, uh, of

463
00:24:52,222 --> 00:24:56,122
research going on in the deep ocean, uh,
independent of any commercial interest.

464
00:24:56,151 --> 00:25:00,041
And so- Right … for example, I was
involved in, uh, well, three European

465
00:25:00,041 --> 00:25:03,521
Union-funded deep sea research
projects, one of which was looking at

466
00:25:03,522 --> 00:25:07,881
the potential for, uh, impact of deep
seabed mining, uh, and was the largest

467
00:25:07,882 --> 00:25:13,100
publicly, uh, funded Uh, project of
its kind in the world at the time, so

468
00:25:13,179 --> 00:25:17,040
attracted scientists from around the
world to various meetings and so forth.

469
00:25:17,290 --> 00:25:17,500
Yeah.

470
00:25:17,530 --> 00:25:22,449
But, uh, much of it has been
produced by the contractors, uh, the

471
00:25:22,459 --> 00:25:23,929
companies that want to go mining.

472
00:25:23,939 --> 00:25:23,949
Hmm.

473
00:25:24,399 --> 00:25:27,560
Com- companies and the, and the
countries that have got these

474
00:25:27,590 --> 00:25:29,110
exploration contracts with the ISA.

475
00:25:29,969 --> 00:25:34,409
And again, I say ironically because the
lead company that's been involved in this

476
00:25:34,409 --> 00:25:36,570
is one called, uh, The Metals Company.

477
00:25:36,799 --> 00:25:37,049
Yeah.

478
00:25:37,049 --> 00:25:39,469
Its CEO is a guy named Gerard Barron.

479
00:25:39,559 --> 00:25:39,779
Yeah.

480
00:25:39,979 --> 00:25:43,810
Um, and he was famously quoted, I
think in a Time magazine article

481
00:25:43,810 --> 00:25:49,540
that ran in September of 2021, that
it's a biological desert down there.

482
00:25:49,699 --> 00:25:53,189
In other words, there's basically
nothing living, uh, that we need to

483
00:25:53,210 --> 00:25:56,869
worry about, and it won't be possible
to impact the marine environment

484
00:25:56,879 --> 00:25:58,459
because it's a dead environment.

485
00:25:58,460 --> 00:26:02,199
There's nothing, there's nothing
there- Yeah … uh, worth, worth,

486
00:26:02,269 --> 00:26:03,669
uh, that's gonna get impacted.

487
00:26:04,280 --> 00:26:08,389
Uh, and the reality is the, the, the
kind of science… And to The Metals

488
00:26:08,389 --> 00:26:11,809
Company's credit, they are allowing the
scientists that they contract to come

489
00:26:11,809 --> 00:26:16,949
in and do this baseline information
to publish their findings, uh, as

490
00:26:16,949 --> 00:26:18,639
have some of the other contractors.

491
00:26:18,680 --> 00:26:24,651
Uh, there's one called the, uh, the, uh,
Global Sea, uh- Seabed Resources, GSR from

492
00:26:24,661 --> 00:26:28,062
Belgium, um, uh, a, a number of others.

493
00:26:28,111 --> 00:26:31,861
Um, they're, they're kind of coming
and going as, as it stands these days.

494
00:26:31,871 --> 00:26:31,891
Yeah.

495
00:26:32,381 --> 00:26:35,721
But, a- and the science is all
pointing to the fact that, whoa, this

496
00:26:35,721 --> 00:26:37,641
is a biologically very rich area.

497
00:26:38,011 --> 00:26:42,011
There's not a high abundance
of animals, uh, but there is an

498
00:26:42,022 --> 00:26:46,522
extraordinary diversity of animals,
including many, many which we're

499
00:26:46,522 --> 00:26:47,932
just discovering for the first time.

500
00:26:48,692 --> 00:26:56,891
Uh, and, and, and, and, and that is
basically stalling the effort to get at

501
00:26:56,891 --> 00:27:03,562
least the International Seabed Authority
to adopt regulations and start, uh,

502
00:27:03,611 --> 00:27:05,772
allowing commercial mining to take place.

503
00:27:05,952 --> 00:27:08,022
And- Because- Sorry, go ahead.

504
00:27:08,101 --> 00:27:08,591
Yeah, I'm sorry.

505
00:27:08,691 --> 00:27:14,401
Go ahead … because the, the, the rules,
the regulations, uh, well, I should say

506
00:27:14,402 --> 00:27:19,041
the, the actual treaty law under which the
International Seabed operates, uh, has a

507
00:27:19,062 --> 00:27:23,601
provision that basically says the ISA must
ensure the effective protection of the

508
00:27:23,601 --> 00:27:27,661
marine environment from harmful effects
arising out of seabed mining activities.

509
00:27:28,472 --> 00:27:31,732
And what a lot of countries that, that
are involved in these negotiations

510
00:27:31,732 --> 00:27:34,861
are saying is, "Well, back in the
'70s, nobody knew that there was

511
00:27:34,872 --> 00:27:36,081
much living down here." You know?

512
00:27:36,161 --> 00:27:36,331
Right.

513
00:27:36,332 --> 00:27:40,352
The assumption was you could protect the,
y- uh, protecting the environment would

514
00:27:40,361 --> 00:27:43,251
be an easy thing to do because there
really wasn't an, much of an environment,

515
00:27:43,311 --> 00:27:44,731
a living environment to protect.

516
00:27:45,171 --> 00:27:48,111
And now we know the picture
is very, very different.

517
00:27:48,141 --> 00:27:48,161
Yeah.

518
00:27:48,341 --> 00:27:53,462
And so they're saying until we can
fully understand what lives down there,

519
00:27:53,472 --> 00:27:58,631
how these species interact, how these,
uh, uh, uh, ecosystems function, and

520
00:27:59,211 --> 00:28:04,532
in addition, what kinds of goods and
services do deep sea ecosystems provide

521
00:28:04,621 --> 00:28:09,241
us, humankind, uh, in terms of their
impacts of, of planetary processes,

522
00:28:09,871 --> 00:28:11,131
uh, we're not gonna allow mining.

523
00:28:11,161 --> 00:28:12,131
We're not gonna vote for it.

524
00:28:12,131 --> 00:28:12,161
Yeah.

525
00:28:12,161 --> 00:28:14,731
We're not gonna, we're not gonna
agree to it because we simply

526
00:28:14,771 --> 00:28:15,992
don't know what the risks are.

527
00:28:16,031 --> 00:28:16,861
We know what the risks are.

528
00:28:16,861 --> 00:28:19,661
We don't know the scale of the risk,
and we don't know how bad it's gonna be.

529
00:28:20,361 --> 00:28:24,241
Um, and- Now, the interesting thing
about this too is, is this has been, it

530
00:28:24,241 --> 00:28:28,191
seems like, uh, like these policies were,
were there with the ISA for, for quite

531
00:28:28,191 --> 00:28:33,081
some time, uh, that you just mentioned,
where, you know, you can't harm the,

532
00:28:33,111 --> 00:28:34,802
the bottom, you can't harm the deep sea.

533
00:28:35,551 --> 00:28:39,081
However, it seemed like just a couple
years ago, before there was a change

534
00:28:39,081 --> 00:28:42,991
in the chair at the ISA, that things
were leaning a little differently.

535
00:28:42,991 --> 00:28:45,971
They were leaning more towards
exploratory mining, even though the,

536
00:28:46,342 --> 00:28:49,462
many of the countries said, "No, we have
a moratorium." There seemed to be more

537
00:28:49,462 --> 00:28:51,281
countries who were, who were going to it.

538
00:28:51,671 --> 00:28:55,231
Uh, the chair at the time, uh, I, I don't
remember the, the, the gentleman's name,

539
00:28:55,232 --> 00:29:00,581
but he was, he was kind of being Not
to say outwardly accused, but allegedly

540
00:29:00,591 --> 00:29:05,442
making more deals about mining than, than
worrying about the en- the environment.

541
00:29:05,442 --> 00:29:08,921
And that was a concern to a lot
of nonprofit organizations, NGOs,

542
00:29:08,921 --> 00:29:12,111
and, and, and the environmental
community and scientists and so forth.

543
00:29:12,641 --> 00:29:16,742
Um, and then now with the new chair,
who's an oceanographer, uh, background

544
00:29:16,742 --> 00:29:21,302
as an oceanographer, it seems like
these are being more held, uh, a lot

545
00:29:21,302 --> 00:29:24,291
closely, you know, to being like,
"Hey, let's follow this. Let's make

546
00:29:24,292 --> 00:29:28,521
sure that this is what we're gonna be
doing." Did you-- Have you noticed that

547
00:29:28,531 --> 00:29:30,131
switch as well with this new chair?

548
00:29:30,922 --> 00:29:34,951
Well, uh, to be honest with
you, Andrew, not really, and

549
00:29:34,951 --> 00:29:36,381
that's a big disappointment.

550
00:29:36,742 --> 00:29:36,982
Hmm.

551
00:29:36,982 --> 00:29:39,171
The previous secretary
general was Michael Lodge.

552
00:29:39,281 --> 00:29:39,511
Right.

553
00:29:39,521 --> 00:29:42,751
Um, he served as secretary general
of the International Seabed

554
00:29:42,751 --> 00:29:44,502
Authority from 2016 to 2024.

555
00:29:45,461 --> 00:29:50,692
Um, he lost an election for a third term
to Letícia Carvalho, an oceanographer from

556
00:29:50,692 --> 00:29:53,982
Brazil, um, who ran a very good campaign.

557
00:29:53,982 --> 00:29:56,492
The Brazilians were, were brilliant
in terms of doing their- Yeah.

558
00:29:56,492 --> 00:30:00,021
It was a surprise, I think, to a lot
of people that, that she got it, but

559
00:30:00,171 --> 00:30:01,881
everybody was like, "This is great." Yeah.

560
00:30:01,881 --> 00:30:02,121
Yeah.

561
00:30:02,121 --> 00:30:02,601
Exactly.

562
00:30:02,602 --> 00:30:03,911
Here, now- Yeah … finally a change.

563
00:30:03,922 --> 00:30:03,942
Yeah.

564
00:30:03,951 --> 00:30:08,162
Because basically, Michael Lodge was
seen as, as heavily promoting deep seabed

565
00:30:08,181 --> 00:30:14,751
mining, and, uh, allegedly kind of working
with the Metals Company to try to get,

566
00:30:15,111 --> 00:30:21,111
um, a, a fast track process to, uh, adopt
regulations to allow deep seabed mining.

567
00:30:21,111 --> 00:30:23,931
And this was this kind of obscure
provision in the Law of the Sea

568
00:30:23,931 --> 00:30:25,802
Convention called the two-year rule.

569
00:30:26,371 --> 00:30:30,061
Technically, it's in the 1994 agreement
that amended the, the elements

570
00:30:30,062 --> 00:30:31,351
of the Law of the Sea convention.

571
00:30:31,951 --> 00:30:37,772
Uh, but basically, the Metals Company
needed the country of Nauru, which

572
00:30:37,772 --> 00:30:42,801
sponsors it, uh, at the ISA, uh, to
trigger a two-year rule so that it could

573
00:30:42,812 --> 00:30:48,712
then say to investors, "Hey, we now have a
legal pathway to get a mining license, uh,

574
00:30:48,812 --> 00:30:51,201
in two years' time, one way or the other."

575
00:30:51,201 --> 00:30:53,381
And I won't go into the
details of this provision.

576
00:30:53,391 --> 00:30:57,641
If you're interested in, it's paragraphs
15-- paragraph 15 of section one

577
00:30:57,641 --> 00:30:59,401
of the annex of the 1994 agreement.

578
00:30:59,731 --> 00:31:00,212
Look it up.

579
00:31:00,651 --> 00:31:00,722
But, uh,

580
00:31:03,761 --> 00:31:07,632
but, you know, it, it, it's, it's with-
it, it's the kind of the, the treaty law

581
00:31:07,632 --> 00:31:09,651
that this, this organization runs under.

582
00:31:09,741 --> 00:31:16,440
And, um You know, the, um, the, uh,
uh, uh, uh, an investigative reporter

583
00:31:16,440 --> 00:31:20,120
for The New York Times, uh, Eric
Lipton, he's won a Pulitzer Prize.

584
00:31:20,219 --> 00:31:24,649
Uh, he's n- uh, well, I won't tell
what he's doing now, but, uh, he's--

585
00:31:24,700 --> 00:31:28,629
he, he was one of the guys behind, uh,
the exposé on, uh, well, maybe not an

586
00:31:28,639 --> 00:31:33,090
exposé, but, uh, the calculations that
the Trump administra- that the Trump

587
00:31:33,090 --> 00:31:37,180
family has, um, uh, made about $2.2
billion in its first year of office.

588
00:31:37,220 --> 00:31:39,780
Uh, but at any rate, he
was looking at the ISA.

589
00:31:39,790 --> 00:31:44,379
He, he went to the meetings of the ISA,
he-- and so forth, and he uncovered

590
00:31:44,379 --> 00:31:48,569
somehow a cache of internal memos
and documents and so forth, going

591
00:31:48,569 --> 00:31:53,159
all the way back to the, uh, early
2000s, if not earlier, of the ISA.

592
00:31:53,179 --> 00:31:56,859
And his conclusion was, and this is a,
an article that he published in, uh,

593
00:31:56,869 --> 00:32:02,300
August of 2022, that in actual fact,
the predecessors of the Metals Company

594
00:32:02,310 --> 00:32:06,879
had illegally obtained information
from the ISA Secretariat- Right

595
00:32:06,879 --> 00:32:11,949
on where the best areas of nodules resided
in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone, this

596
00:32:11,950 --> 00:32:13,245
area- Yeah … in the Eastern Pacific.

597
00:32:13,245 --> 00:32:13,999
I remember hearing that.

598
00:32:13,999 --> 00:32:19,850
Um, and, um, you know, he put, he put
those documents up online, uh, but

599
00:32:19,959 --> 00:32:23,599
separate from The New York Times website,
uh, after publishing the article.

600
00:32:24,349 --> 00:32:29,560
And you can see some connections there,
which, uh, uh, were, uh, less, less,

601
00:32:29,560 --> 00:32:33,599
um, how, how would you g- oh, I don't
know, less savory, I think, uh- Yeah

602
00:32:33,610 --> 00:32:34,039
would be the right word.

603
00:32:34,039 --> 00:32:34,059
Yeah.

604
00:32:34,059 --> 00:32:37,670
It was troubling definitely to be like,
look, we're supposed to be, uh, as,

605
00:32:37,709 --> 00:32:41,489
you know, uh, Dr. Andrew Thaler, who's
a good friend of mine, has, no, you

606
00:32:41,489 --> 00:32:44,280
know, he's been involved in deep sea
mining since his PhD, like in terms

607
00:32:44,280 --> 00:32:49,240
of, of looking at the issue and, and,
and wrote a, a editorial of a deep sea

608
00:32:49,240 --> 00:32:50,889
magazine, Deep Sea Mining magazine.

609
00:32:51,569 --> 00:32:51,670
Mm-hmm.

610
00:32:51,670 --> 00:32:56,460
And he said, "This is the chance for us
as a human species to do-- if we're gonna

611
00:32:56,470 --> 00:33:01,780
do something, to do it right, and to
ensure that the protection of this zone

612
00:33:01,780 --> 00:33:06,519
that we don't know much about in, in, in,
in all relativity here, like we, and we

613
00:33:06,519 --> 00:33:11,049
just don't know, that we could probably
do it right and do it very carefully.

614
00:33:11,220 --> 00:33:16,369
And we have the chance to set, you know,
the, the limitations and the restrictions

615
00:33:16,369 --> 00:33:22,474
right off the bat." But it seemed like
that Uh, Michael Lodge was not doing that.

616
00:33:22,544 --> 00:33:26,344
It seemed like he was just more like,
"Hey, let's just go and let's do this,"

617
00:33:26,374 --> 00:33:29,944
as you mentioned, you know, leaking
some reports and, and things like that.

618
00:33:30,004 --> 00:33:32,323
And that, that, that's, that's
definitely concerning, right?

619
00:33:32,923 --> 00:33:33,603
Yeah, it was.

620
00:33:33,633 --> 00:33:34,274
It was.

621
00:33:34,314 --> 00:33:39,964
And, you know, the whole, uh, process
of negotiating the regulations which

622
00:33:39,964 --> 00:33:44,734
needed to be in place in order to allow
mining to begin went into hyperdrive

623
00:33:44,743 --> 00:33:48,043
when Nauru triggered the two-year
rule on behalf of the Metals Company.

624
00:33:48,743 --> 00:33:54,624
And eventually, countries rebelled after
two years of three meetings, hundreds

625
00:33:54,624 --> 00:33:59,243
of pages of draft regulations, thousands
of brackets, meaning the text that's

626
00:33:59,243 --> 00:34:00,724
not yet been agreed but been- Yeah

627
00:34:00,753 --> 00:34:01,203
proposed.

628
00:34:01,763 --> 00:34:06,183
Um, and after about two years of
this, countries just said, "Enough

629
00:34:06,183 --> 00:34:09,464
is enough. We can't d- we can't
maintain this pace. We don't have

630
00:34:09,464 --> 00:34:11,183
the capacity to do this," et cetera.

631
00:34:11,203 --> 00:34:12,574
It's extremely complex.

632
00:34:12,843 --> 00:34:12,873
Mm-hmm.

633
00:34:12,894 --> 00:34:17,514
And fundamentally, uh, there are some
serious kind of, you know, concerns such

634
00:34:17,514 --> 00:34:22,963
as, yes, you know, we need to understand
this ecosystem before we can possibly,

635
00:34:22,964 --> 00:34:27,083
these areas, uh, slated for mining,
before we can possibly regulate them to

636
00:34:27,083 --> 00:34:28,754
prevent damage to the marine environment.

637
00:34:29,243 --> 00:34:31,473
Um, and we just don't
have that understanding.

638
00:34:31,634 --> 00:34:38,233
And that was, that, that, that kind of
unders- that, that kind of sense of, of

639
00:34:38,234 --> 00:34:42,014
where things were at kind of crossed the
political groups and the- Yeah … various

640
00:34:42,014 --> 00:34:46,954
kind of coalitions, uh, as it were, uh,
within the negotiating process of the ISA.

641
00:34:47,734 --> 00:34:51,804
Uh, and, um, you know, I think that's
in part why Michael Lodge was voted out.

642
00:34:51,804 --> 00:34:52,344
Right.

643
00:34:52,344 --> 00:34:52,704
Right.

644
00:34:52,774 --> 00:34:56,203
'Cause he said, "Okay, look, you
really wanna get this." Yeah.

645
00:34:56,253 --> 00:34:58,494
There were some countries
that were actually backing

646
00:34:58,494 --> 00:34:59,633
that too- Yes … as well.

647
00:34:59,853 --> 00:35:00,113
Yes.

648
00:35:00,124 --> 00:35:05,353
But they would not have b- been, uh,
they would not have risked themselves

649
00:35:05,383 --> 00:35:07,343
triggering the so-called two-year rule.

650
00:35:07,493 --> 00:35:13,406
They let Nauru do it on behalf of the
TMC rather than, um Doing it themselves.

651
00:35:13,406 --> 00:35:16,786
But Norway, for example, was saying,
"Yes, we need to get these regulations in

652
00:35:16,786 --> 00:35:22,886
place," because Norway was planning at the
time to mine in international waters- Yes

653
00:35:23,096 --> 00:35:27,995
… off the Norwegian coast, but in an area
considered under the Law of the Sea to be

654
00:35:28,025 --> 00:35:33,035
part of Norway's own extended continental
shelf, and therefore Norway could

655
00:35:33,036 --> 00:35:34,765
mine there- They have the jurisdiction

656
00:35:34,795 --> 00:35:36,526
without getting permission
from the, uh, uh, ISA.

657
00:35:36,846 --> 00:35:37,116
Right.

658
00:35:37,116 --> 00:35:42,045
But what Norway, I think, uh, was
hoping for, and I think what Japan

659
00:35:42,075 --> 00:35:46,836
was considering as well at the time,
was if we're gonna go mining, we want

660
00:35:46,836 --> 00:35:50,506
to mine, we want to be able to show
that we're mining according to the

661
00:35:50,506 --> 00:35:53,846
regulations adopted by the international
community of nations as a whole.

662
00:35:54,276 --> 00:35:54,496
Yeah.

663
00:35:54,506 --> 00:36:00,046
Uh, it's sustainable, it can be done, and
therefore once the ISA has regulations

664
00:36:00,046 --> 00:36:03,565
in place, we can then use those
regulations to go mining, and we're not

665
00:36:03,565 --> 00:36:08,535
gonna suffer market approbation and, and
restrictions and, and so forth and so on.

666
00:36:08,936 --> 00:36:11,785
Well, and I think also, like, when
you're the first country to do something

667
00:36:11,785 --> 00:36:16,145
that's not very popular with the
public, there's a lot of pressure on

668
00:36:16,145 --> 00:36:21,336
that country, you know, just from the
outward negative attention that they get.

669
00:36:21,336 --> 00:36:23,895
And I know some countries will
do it no matter what because

670
00:36:23,895 --> 00:36:26,955
it's good for their country, but
also some don't wanna do that.

671
00:36:27,296 --> 00:36:29,626
You know, some don't
like that bad reputation.

672
00:36:29,885 --> 00:36:33,426
Um, you know, you can almost, if you look
at, you know, something like whaling with

673
00:36:33,426 --> 00:36:36,946
Japan, you know, for, for decades and
decades they fought to whale in the South,

674
00:36:37,215 --> 00:36:40,375
South Ocean, uh, Southern Ocean, and
then they finally just said, "We're just

675
00:36:40,375 --> 00:36:43,955
gonna keep it within our borders because
we keep getting this negative attention.

676
00:36:44,046 --> 00:36:46,686
It's, it's just not good
for us," and, and so forth.

677
00:36:46,686 --> 00:36:48,815
I, I'm not saying that's the, the
only reason, but I'm sure there

678
00:36:48,815 --> 00:36:51,756
were many other reasons, but-
Yeah … that was a, a big part of it.

679
00:36:51,836 --> 00:36:54,575
Um- That's right … do you think that has
to do with it, that, that international

680
00:36:54,575 --> 00:36:58,488
pressure to be like, "Hey, look, if we
haven't agreed to this yet You know,

681
00:36:58,538 --> 00:36:59,688
there are gonna be some protests.

682
00:36:59,688 --> 00:37:02,128
There are gonna be some people like
Greenpeace and so forth who are gonna be

683
00:37:02,128 --> 00:37:05,528
going and they're gonna be saying, "Hey,
you shouldn't be doing this because it's

684
00:37:05,538 --> 00:37:09,708
not internationally, you know, agreed
upon and we haven't even agreed upon the

685
00:37:09,708 --> 00:37:13,228
regulations to make sure we're protecting
that environment." Uh, that's right.

686
00:37:13,278 --> 00:37:14,218
That's absolutely right.

687
00:37:14,258 --> 00:37:17,878
You know, one of the things, again,
hardwired into the Law of the Sea,

688
00:37:17,878 --> 00:37:22,507
which is the treaty, uh, that actually
governs, uh, how the ISAs operate, is

689
00:37:22,537 --> 00:37:29,527
that the ISA is to, is, is obliged to,
quote, "act on behalf of," unquote, and

690
00:37:29,527 --> 00:37:34,688
quote, "for the benefit of," unquote,
"humankind as a whole." Not for individual

691
00:37:34,707 --> 00:37:38,007
countries, not for companies that
wanna make a profit, but for something

692
00:37:38,007 --> 00:37:41,717
that's going to contribute to the
wellbeing, uh, of humankind as a whole.

693
00:37:42,147 --> 00:37:47,147
And this, again, is another dilemma, uh,
facing negotiators at the ISA because

694
00:37:47,147 --> 00:37:50,407
there are some countries that do wanna
get these mining regulations in place

695
00:37:51,137 --> 00:37:55,758
for themselves or the contractors that
they sponsor to go mining, or at least

696
00:37:55,768 --> 00:37:59,847
to say for the private companies, "Okay,
now we've got regulations in place.

697
00:37:59,847 --> 00:38:03,608
You can make your own sorts of judgments
as to whether you can mine profitably

698
00:38:03,608 --> 00:38:08,767
or not, knowing what the regulations
are gonna cost you." But the, the,

699
00:38:08,788 --> 00:38:13,057
the obligation is there to justify the
mining, uh, on behalf-- as, as something

700
00:38:13,057 --> 00:38:16,748
that's going to be done on behalf of all
of us and for the benefit of everybody.

701
00:38:16,877 --> 00:38:16,897
Yeah.

702
00:38:17,197 --> 00:38:22,468
And the-- anybody that looks at this
industry at the moment and looks at

703
00:38:22,468 --> 00:38:27,117
the pressures that, that, that are,
that are kind of, you know, trying

704
00:38:27,117 --> 00:38:32,278
to get the mining, um to, to, to, to
move forward, to become a commercial

705
00:38:32,278 --> 00:38:36,508
reality, recognizes this isn't being
done for the benefit of anybody but

706
00:38:36,508 --> 00:38:40,018
a handful of countries and a handful
of companies that wanna make money.

707
00:38:40,618 --> 00:38:43,638
It's not gonna produce much in terms
of- Right … global supplies of

708
00:38:43,667 --> 00:38:47,268
cobalt, copper, nickel, and, and, and,
and manganese, which is, which are

709
00:38:47,268 --> 00:38:49,792
the four metals that are contained in
these nodules that are recoverable-

710
00:38:49,792 --> 00:38:52,627
Mm-hmm … uh, economically.

711
00:38:52,667 --> 00:38:55,858
You hear lithium is in the nodules,
you hear rare earth are in the nodules.

712
00:38:55,877 --> 00:38:56,248
Well, they're not.

713
00:38:56,248 --> 00:39:00,227
I mean, yes, you have trace elements
of these, but all of the debate at

714
00:39:00,227 --> 00:39:05,368
the International Seabed Authority
since 2019 when they first began

715
00:39:05,658 --> 00:39:10,517
considering the economics of, of
the mining industry for nodules, um,

716
00:39:10,847 --> 00:39:14,857
rare earths have been considered a,
a, a non-starter simply because- Hmm

717
00:39:14,967 --> 00:39:18,188
processing these nodules to extract the
rare earth, rare earths would make it

718
00:39:18,198 --> 00:39:22,988
much more expensive to process the nodules
for the manganese, cobalt, the cobalt,

719
00:39:23,018 --> 00:39:26,307
copper, and nickel primarily- Gotcha
… which are the big money earners there.

720
00:39:26,887 --> 00:39:32,217
Um, and so again, that's stalling the
process because, you know, countries,

721
00:39:32,227 --> 00:39:35,998
uh, negotiators negotiating in good
faith on the basis of what was agreed

722
00:39:35,998 --> 00:39:39,017
in the 1970s, which is when the Law
of the Sea negotiations first took

723
00:39:39,017 --> 00:39:43,858
place, are saying, "If we're going to
abide by this principle, uh, and this

724
00:39:43,858 --> 00:39:48,057
legal obligation, we cannot start, uh,
allowing mining to go forward now."

725
00:39:48,337 --> 00:39:48,577
Right.

726
00:39:48,587 --> 00:39:51,877
It's just, it's not going to
pay out to humankind as a whole.

727
00:39:51,937 --> 00:39:56,527
You know, the idea- Yeah … back in the
'70s was that the, the amounts of metals

728
00:39:56,527 --> 00:40:04,027
in the deep sea are so vast that the ISA,
uh, authorizing mining for these metals

729
00:40:04,057 --> 00:40:07,967
would bring in a huge amount of money
to the International Seabed Authority,

730
00:40:07,968 --> 00:40:12,017
which would then be shared out amongst all
countries of the world, and in particular,

731
00:40:12,437 --> 00:40:14,227
uh, benefit developing countries.

732
00:40:14,248 --> 00:40:17,617
It would be a- Yeah … financial boom-
Right … uh, to developing countries.

733
00:40:17,617 --> 00:40:21,887
And of course, today, we now know, looking
at the economics of this industry, that

734
00:40:21,887 --> 00:40:26,237
in fact it's going to generate very little
money, uh- Huh … particularly as in

735
00:40:26,237 --> 00:40:28,328
terms of royalty payments for the ISA.

736
00:40:28,917 --> 00:40:34,117
And those royalty payments will largely
go to funding the ISA itself to keep on

737
00:40:34,117 --> 00:40:40,417
operating and, uh, to, uh, accommodate or
meet an obligation of the International

738
00:40:40,417 --> 00:40:44,417
Seabed Authority that again, in, in the
Law of the Sea Convention rather, from

739
00:40:44,417 --> 00:40:52,776
the, again, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, from
the 1970s, that the, um, the ISA would

740
00:40:52,796 --> 00:40:57,496
have to pay developing countries who had
substantial terrestrial mining economies

741
00:40:57,506 --> 00:41:02,786
for the same metals compensation for any
loss of income to those countries as a

742
00:41:02,786 --> 00:41:08,216
result of the decrease in prices as a,
uh, coming from, uh, seabed mining and

743
00:41:08,216 --> 00:41:09,915
seabed minerals being put onto the market.

744
00:41:10,755 --> 00:41:13,906
And so a lot of the analysis, and in
fact we just, we just re- released

745
00:41:14,005 --> 00:41:16,406
an analysis, uh, uh, done by Koyaan.

746
00:41:17,605 --> 00:41:19,786
Uh, a fellow named Johnny
West owns this company.

747
00:41:19,796 --> 00:41:23,575
He's been advised a lot of ch-
uh, uh, uh, countries that are

748
00:41:23,716 --> 00:41:28,355
l- you know, negotiating, uh, uh,
uh, arrangements or contracts with

749
00:41:28,566 --> 00:41:29,916
terrestrial mining industries.

750
00:41:30,366 --> 00:41:34,285
Um, he's calculated, and, and I've
actually done similar calculations, that

751
00:41:34,296 --> 00:41:37,985
the ISA is likely to operate at a loss-
Interesting … if it's gonna meet, uh,

752
00:41:38,046 --> 00:41:41,435
if, if they're gonna meet that obligation
to compensate developing countries whose-

753
00:41:41,445 --> 00:41:44,805
Yeah … economies are substantially
dependent upon mining the same metals.

754
00:41:45,185 --> 00:41:45,405
Right.

755
00:41:45,406 --> 00:41:48,535
And so, you know, e- economically
it doesn't make sense.

756
00:41:48,595 --> 00:41:52,206
For the ISA in particular, it's,
it's, it's, it's a huge risk.

757
00:41:52,735 --> 00:41:55,715
You can't, they can't guarantee they're
gonna effectively protect the marine

758
00:41:55,715 --> 00:41:57,125
environment for harmful effects.

759
00:41:57,535 --> 00:42:01,665
Um, you can't mi- you know, you can't,
you can't basically regulate an industry's

760
00:42:01,665 --> 00:42:04,746
impact on the environment if you don't
understand what that environment is.

761
00:42:04,906 --> 00:42:05,116
Yeah.

762
00:42:05,116 --> 00:42:07,165
And, and, and then, and the
metrics are pretty clear.

763
00:42:07,175 --> 00:42:09,975
You know, I mean, there's a lot
that, you know, y- when, when you

764
00:42:09,975 --> 00:42:14,565
talk about baseline information and
so forth, you know, uh, a- and, and

765
00:42:14,825 --> 00:42:17,815
connectivity and, and, and so forth,
it gets a little bit complicated.

766
00:42:17,815 --> 00:42:19,675
But there are some simple metrics.

767
00:42:19,675 --> 00:42:25,595
When I get asked, for example, um,
you know, "Okay, scientists say we n-

768
00:42:25,605 --> 00:42:27,485
always say we need more information.

769
00:42:27,565 --> 00:42:28,786
I mean, how much is enough?

770
00:42:28,815 --> 00:42:31,235
When do we know we have
enough?" And I say, "Well, okay.

771
00:42:31,235 --> 00:42:35,185
There are some, you know, some fairly, uh,
complex an- answers to that, but here's

772
00:42:35,185 --> 00:42:40,525
a simple one." And the one I ci- cite is,
is this, that, um, and bear with me on

773
00:42:40,525 --> 00:42:45,345
this, but, uh- Of course … y-y-y- is,
um, uh, Marielle Rabone and her colleagues

774
00:42:45,345 --> 00:42:49,895
at the Natural History Museum in London,
uh, published a paper in 2003, I think it

775
00:42:49,895 --> 00:42:57,590
was Where they looked at the collections,
uh, in natural history museums around the

776
00:42:57,590 --> 00:43:03,480
world of organisms that had been brought
up from the Clarion-Clipperton Zone, the

777
00:43:03,480 --> 00:43:06,899
area of the Eastern Pacific where most
of the mining interest currently lies.

778
00:43:07,480 --> 00:43:13,879
And they came up with, uh, 5,500-plus,
uh, organisms, uh, that, um, that,

779
00:43:13,890 --> 00:43:17,719
that were geolocated to having been
collected over the previous decades,

780
00:43:17,749 --> 00:43:19,219
not just in the last few years.

781
00:43:19,739 --> 00:43:25,229
Um, and, uh, of which only 500 had
been tox- taxonomically identified.

782
00:43:25,299 --> 00:43:29,540
In other words- Hmm … only a 10th of
these organisms, or less, had actually

783
00:43:29,540 --> 00:43:34,599
been id- well, they were roughly 10th,
uh, 500-plus, uh, had been taxonomically

784
00:43:34,599 --> 00:43:38,729
identified, meaning there is some
indication, some knowledge of how these

785
00:43:38,749 --> 00:43:43,460
organisms function, wh- whether they
fee- filter feed or digest food, whether

786
00:43:43,460 --> 00:43:47,349
they're living in sediments or they're
sessile organisms, meaning they attach

787
00:43:47,349 --> 00:43:51,329
themselves to the, uh, to the nodules
and grow, such as corals and sponges.

788
00:43:51,869 --> 00:43:56,729
Um, and there's still another 5,000 to go.

789
00:43:57,040 --> 00:43:57,310
Yeah.

790
00:43:57,349 --> 00:44:03,219
Uh, the, the IS- the International Seabed
Authority launched a, the, um, Sustainable

791
00:44:03,220 --> 00:44:07,850
Seabed Knowledge Initiative together with
the IOC as part of the UN Decade of Ocean

792
00:44:07,850 --> 00:44:13,609
Science, I think in 2002, '22 rather- Yeah
… at the UN Ocean Conference in, in Lisbon.

793
00:44:14,249 --> 00:44:18,989
And, and they set themselves a
target of identifying, taxonomically

794
00:44:18,989 --> 00:44:24,858
identifying over 1,000 species by 2030
And so assuming they meet that goal,

795
00:44:25,678 --> 00:44:27,878
there's still another 4,500 to go.

796
00:44:28,278 --> 00:44:30,668
Um, and of course Robodeau and her
colleagues, and they were looking

797
00:44:30,668 --> 00:44:33,558
at metazoan species, not all the
microbes and everything or the, the-

798
00:44:33,638 --> 00:44:35,817
Yeah … biofauna or the microfauna.

799
00:44:35,818 --> 00:44:40,077
Um, uh, uh, uh, they estimated
there's probably at least another

800
00:44:40,077 --> 00:44:41,987
6,000 yet to be discovered.

801
00:44:41,997 --> 00:44:42,347
Geez.

802
00:44:42,377 --> 00:44:43,558
Possibly many more.

803
00:44:43,788 --> 00:44:44,018
Yeah.

804
00:44:44,018 --> 00:44:47,967
And so here's a simple metric that,
that, that you can explain to people

805
00:44:48,657 --> 00:44:53,097
negotiating these regulations at the ISA
why they need to wait until they have a

806
00:44:53,108 --> 00:44:56,837
much better understanding, because there
is still a whole range of species that

807
00:44:56,837 --> 00:44:58,268
would be vulnerable to the mining- Yeah

808
00:44:58,798 --> 00:45:00,567
that you don't know anything about.

809
00:45:00,618 --> 00:45:05,047
You don't know what, how they contribute
to just the, the, the natural processes

810
00:45:05,057 --> 00:45:09,368
of, of the deep sea that, that- Yeah
… can be crucial, and we have no idea.

811
00:45:09,888 --> 00:45:10,088
Yeah.

812
00:45:10,088 --> 00:45:11,857
And you don't know how they reproduce.

813
00:45:11,868 --> 00:45:11,888
Yeah.

814
00:45:11,897 --> 00:45:15,597
You don't know how, you know, what,
what, what their young look like or- Yeah

815
00:45:15,607 --> 00:45:19,408
what the vulnerabilities they are,
they, they would be to sediment in the

816
00:45:19,408 --> 00:45:23,157
water column at the larval stage, or
if they're filter-feeding organisms-

817
00:45:23,157 --> 00:45:27,457
Right … how that they may clog those
apparatuses, uh, and make it far more

818
00:45:27,457 --> 00:45:29,357
difficult for those species to survive.

819
00:45:29,357 --> 00:45:30,127
So- Agree … yeah.

820
00:45:30,537 --> 00:45:35,397
No, and, and every year, you know, the,
the ISA meets twice a year to discuss

821
00:45:35,427 --> 00:45:40,898
and negotiate certain terms and items
within, within the ISA documents.

822
00:45:41,317 --> 00:45:45,717
Um, they just finished a two-week stint
of looking at, in, in, from in July,

823
00:45:45,728 --> 00:45:50,428
look, in, in Kingston, Jamaica, uh,
looking at a lot of different things.

824
00:45:50,497 --> 00:45:53,597
Um, can you walk us through those me-
Were you at the meetings and, and can you

825
00:45:53,597 --> 00:45:56,657
walk us through the- Yeah … the, the
sort of the updates from those meetings?

826
00:45:57,307 --> 00:45:57,567
Yeah.

827
00:45:57,567 --> 00:45:59,897
Let me just pull up something
on my screen here- Sure

828
00:45:59,897 --> 00:46:02,877
um, to remind myself, 'cause there was
quite a bit- There was a lot, yeah.

829
00:46:02,877 --> 00:46:04,498
There was a lot being discussed there.

830
00:46:04,508 --> 00:46:10,962
But, uh, let me just see here So, well,
one of the big topics, uh, on the agenda,

831
00:46:10,971 --> 00:46:12,341
it was actually a three-week meeting.

832
00:46:12,551 --> 00:46:12,822
Okay.

833
00:46:13,032 --> 00:46:17,082
Um, two, two weeks of the
Council of the ISA, which is

834
00:46:17,091 --> 00:46:18,631
now meeting only twice a year.

835
00:46:18,631 --> 00:46:23,912
Up until 2025, it was meeting three
times a year between 2022 and 2025.

836
00:46:24,041 --> 00:46:24,431
Gotcha.

837
00:46:24,672 --> 00:46:27,562
Um, or between 2022 and 2024, actually.

838
00:46:27,672 --> 00:46:32,582
Um, and then, uh, after the two weeks
of the council meeting in July, there

839
00:46:32,582 --> 00:46:36,892
was the annual meeting, it's only once a
year, of the Assembly of the ISA, which

840
00:46:36,892 --> 00:46:40,811
is the supreme body of the ISA, as it's
called in the Law of the Sea Convention.

841
00:46:41,351 --> 00:46:47,202
But in reality, the, the, the-- all
of the negotiation or virtually all

842
00:46:47,202 --> 00:46:51,902
of the negotiation for, on the, on
the mining regulations and the royalty

843
00:46:51,902 --> 00:46:55,331
regime and so forth takes place within
the meeting of the Council of the ISA.

844
00:46:55,921 --> 00:47:02,631
And it's a body of 36 countries, uh,
of the 172 now, I believe, countries

845
00:47:02,631 --> 00:47:05,631
that are, that are members of the
ISA that actually is charged with

846
00:47:05,631 --> 00:47:08,031
negotiating the, um, the regulations.

847
00:47:08,392 --> 00:47:14,001
But one of the biggest issue… Well,
so, so, um, a-again, this year, as

848
00:47:14,001 --> 00:47:19,551
in the previous, the last few years,
they, they made limited progress

849
00:47:19,611 --> 00:47:22,521
on negoti- on agreeing things in
the, in the, in the regulations.

850
00:47:22,521 --> 00:47:23,301
Mm-hmm.

851
00:47:23,371 --> 00:47:28,471
Um, there are still well over 100 pages,
I think it's about 200 pages, but again,

852
00:47:28,471 --> 00:47:33,221
lots of brackets and so forth, in the
current draft text of these negotiations

853
00:47:34,414 --> 00:47:38,654
There is ano- there are ancillary
documents, uh, of several hundred pages

854
00:47:38,654 --> 00:47:45,304
more, including draft standards and
guidelines, um, drafts of, uh, uh, uh,

855
00:47:45,353 --> 00:47:50,174
uh, provisions that didn't quite fit
into the current draft text but should

856
00:47:50,184 --> 00:47:54,163
be considered because countries are still
proposing them, so they have to figure out

857
00:47:54,164 --> 00:47:55,944
where to put it in and so forth and so on.

858
00:47:56,594 --> 00:48:02,154
A- and, and probably as many brackets,
meaning unresolved issues in the text,

859
00:48:02,213 --> 00:48:04,053
uh, this year as there were last year.

860
00:48:04,893 --> 00:48:12,053
Uh, there was a debate over setting
a timeline, um, or a, a roadmap

861
00:48:12,283 --> 00:48:14,093
for completing the negotiations.

862
00:48:14,164 --> 00:48:17,153
Uh, and they've done that twice
already and missed the deadline.

863
00:48:17,164 --> 00:48:17,184
Yeah.

864
00:48:17,193 --> 00:48:19,284
So they did a, did a roadmap in, uh…

865
00:48:19,303 --> 00:48:21,613
Well, they actually did a roadmap
in, well, not a roadmap per

866
00:48:21,614 --> 00:48:27,724
se, but a timeline, um, in 2017
to adopt regulations by 2020.

867
00:48:27,774 --> 00:48:29,394
That didn't happen.

868
00:48:29,643 --> 00:48:29,943
Right.

869
00:48:29,983 --> 00:48:34,094
Uh, then Nauru triggered the two-year
rule, which meant that they needed to

870
00:48:34,103 --> 00:48:41,233
adopt regulations in by 2023 or else
consider giving a provisional license to,

871
00:48:41,233 --> 00:48:43,033
in this case, the metals company to mine.

872
00:48:43,553 --> 00:48:44,974
Uh, they didn't do either.

873
00:48:45,424 --> 00:48:50,843
Uh, they set a kind of a tentative
timeline for 2025 and missed that as well.

874
00:48:50,983 --> 00:48:54,253
Uh, so what they've, what they
were talking about this past, um,

875
00:48:54,814 --> 00:48:58,283
beginning last year was rather
than a new timeline, a roadmap.

876
00:48:58,283 --> 00:49:02,323
Identify the key issues that need
to be resolved and kind of try

877
00:49:02,323 --> 00:49:07,863
to pick them off one by one as a
indication of, of progress, uh,

878
00:49:07,893 --> 00:49:11,763
toward eventually completing, uh, the
regulations, or at least making progress

879
00:49:11,793 --> 00:49:13,413
toward completing the regulations.

880
00:49:13,833 --> 00:49:17,493
But they couldn't agree, uh, on
the, um, on, on the key issues

881
00:49:17,493 --> 00:49:18,513
that needed to be resolved.

882
00:49:18,993 --> 00:49:23,343
Uh, and one of the more fundamental ones,
uh, uh, uh, is the fact that are they

883
00:49:23,344 --> 00:49:30,294
negotiating regulations at the moment
to, um, only from nodule mining, or are

884
00:49:30,294 --> 00:49:35,944
they negotiating regulations for the
three types of ores that the ISA has

885
00:49:35,944 --> 00:49:38,493
developed exploration regulations for?

886
00:49:38,563 --> 00:49:43,054
So the other two types being the ores
called polymetallic sulfides that you

887
00:49:43,063 --> 00:49:48,064
find associated with hydrothermal vents,
or the ores on the sides of some seamount

888
00:49:48,193 --> 00:49:53,674
ecosystems, some seamounts rather in the
deep ocean, uh, called, uh, ferromanganese

889
00:49:53,723 --> 00:49:57,643
cobalt crusts, uh, which is basically
an ore that it's, it's kind of like

890
00:49:57,643 --> 00:50:00,003
a, an accumulation of, of hard- Right

891
00:50:00,013 --> 00:50:03,523
substrate on the surfaces of
these, um, of, of the seamounts.

892
00:50:04,024 --> 00:50:09,363
Or a third option is are they negotiating
a kind of framework set of regulations

893
00:50:09,393 --> 00:50:13,844
that would, would apply to any type of
mineral deposits that would be mined in

894
00:50:13,844 --> 00:50:17,013
the international seabed area, including
some that haven't yet been discovered?

895
00:50:17,543 --> 00:50:17,653
Right.

896
00:50:17,754 --> 00:50:22,704
Um, and that's a pretty fundamental,
uh, uh, you know, difference of

897
00:50:22,704 --> 00:50:25,943
views amongst the states as to what
actually they're negotiating the

898
00:50:25,943 --> 00:50:29,513
regulations for, what type of mining
and, and where and so forth and so on.

899
00:50:30,353 --> 00:50:35,233
Um, but a really key issue, and
this is at the council, uh, was the

900
00:50:35,243 --> 00:50:37,093
whole issue of unilateral mining.

901
00:50:37,243 --> 00:50:42,403
As you know, the United States is now,
NOAA is now, uh, uh, uh, taking on

902
00:50:42,404 --> 00:50:48,504
applications to go mine in the- Yes
… international seabed a- area, uh, in Uh,

903
00:50:48,504 --> 00:50:54,614
i- i- in a, in a way without getting the
authorization of the International Seabed

904
00:50:54,614 --> 00:51:00,444
Authority to do it, um, in a way that
we- that risks fundamentally undermining

905
00:51:00,444 --> 00:51:03,584
the Law of the Sea Convention itself and
the whole structure of the international

906
00:51:03,854 --> 00:51:04,694
maritime order that's been established.

907
00:51:04,694 --> 00:51:04,704
Yeah.

908
00:51:04,704 --> 00:51:06,363
Which the US has not signed to, right?

909
00:51:06,363 --> 00:51:07,593
The, the- Yeah … UN.

910
00:51:07,593 --> 00:51:07,843
Yeah.

911
00:51:07,843 --> 00:51:09,783
The, the US has not ratified.

912
00:51:09,783 --> 00:51:10,223
Ratified, sorry.

913
00:51:10,223 --> 00:51:13,924
And so the US, the, the, the current
administration, but, but has always

914
00:51:13,924 --> 00:51:17,103
cooperated with the ISA- Yes … up
until the Trump administration.

915
00:51:17,273 --> 00:51:17,533
Right.

916
00:51:17,863 --> 00:51:20,714
Under the current administration,
their argument is, and this goes

917
00:51:20,714 --> 00:51:24,043
back to the Reagan years, "Well, we
haven't ratified the Law of the Sea

918
00:51:24,043 --> 00:51:28,563
Convention, uh, uh, and therefore we're
not bound by all of its provisions."

919
00:51:28,564 --> 00:51:31,703
The United States accepts all of
the provisions of the Law of the Sea

920
00:51:31,703 --> 00:51:36,724
Convention as customary international law,
except for the seabed mining provisions.

921
00:51:37,273 --> 00:51:41,333
Mm. Um, and so therefore, it's not acting
in contravention of international law.

922
00:51:41,404 --> 00:51:42,843
Now, that's an issue of some debate.

923
00:51:43,354 --> 00:51:48,173
Uh, but the reality is that the,
if the Metals Company goes mining,

924
00:51:48,174 --> 00:51:50,844
and they're the, the first at
the table here trying to- Yeah

925
00:51:50,844 --> 00:51:56,364
get a mining license from NOAA, um, uh,
it will be operating in contravention

926
00:51:56,373 --> 00:51:57,643
of the Law of the Sea Convention.

927
00:51:57,883 --> 00:52:03,463
Uh, particularly given that many of
the, the individuals and the companies

928
00:52:03,464 --> 00:52:08,654
that are part of the, the, um, the
Metals Company framework, as it were,

929
00:52:08,744 --> 00:52:13,353
its subs- subsidiaries in, in Canada,
well, it, its headquarters is in Canada.

930
00:52:13,354 --> 00:52:13,784
It's Canada, yeah.

931
00:52:13,784 --> 00:52:14,634
Subsidiaries in Canada.

932
00:52:14,933 --> 00:52:19,934
It's got subsidiaries in, in Singapore, in
Australia, in the British Virgin Islands.

933
00:52:20,383 --> 00:52:25,653
Um, the, the other companies that
are either bought into TMC, other

934
00:52:25,653 --> 00:52:30,863
companies, I should say, either bought
into TMC, uh, such as Allseas, which

935
00:52:30,873 --> 00:52:35,164
is the company that owns the mining
ship, without which TMC cannot mine.

936
00:52:35,534 --> 00:52:35,804
Yeah.

937
00:52:35,804 --> 00:52:37,413
TMC doesn't own a mining ship.

938
00:52:37,483 --> 00:52:40,923
It's this company, a Dutch-Swiss
company called Allseas that actually

939
00:52:40,924 --> 00:52:47,353
converted a m- uh, uh, a, an offshore
dr- drill v- um, oil- Yep … drilling

940
00:52:47,354 --> 00:52:51,623
vessel- Yep … uh, platform, uh, from
Petrobras in Brazil to, to a mining ship.

941
00:52:51,814 --> 00:52:57,183
Um, and, and the companies that w-
that TMC is stating that it needs

942
00:52:57,184 --> 00:53:02,683
to, to be a- to, to, to enter into
contract with to process the nodules

943
00:53:02,703 --> 00:53:05,084
when they bring them up off the
bottom and bring them up to shore.

944
00:53:05,084 --> 00:53:09,534
So there's one called PAMCO in Japan,
another called Korea Zinc in Korea.

945
00:53:10,053 --> 00:53:15,222
Uh, and these are all companies based
in countries which have ratified the

946
00:53:15,222 --> 00:53:19,242
Law of the Sea Convention and are
under a legal obligation- Mm-hmm … to

947
00:53:19,242 --> 00:53:24,391
prevent companies, citizens, and their
state agencies over which they hold,

948
00:53:24,472 --> 00:53:30,532
h- you know, have jurisdiction from
participating in a mining operation

949
00:53:30,532 --> 00:53:34,892
in the international seabed area
that is not authorized by the ISA, a

950
00:53:34,892 --> 00:53:36,872
so-called unilateral mining operation.

951
00:53:37,322 --> 00:53:37,512
Hmm.

952
00:53:38,162 --> 00:53:42,071
And so this is getting really
complicated, and this was a big part

953
00:53:42,072 --> 00:53:43,461
of the discussion at the council.

954
00:53:44,092 --> 00:53:49,081
Uh, the ISA has actually, the council
of the ISA has charged the secretary

955
00:53:49,082 --> 00:53:53,062
general and the legal and technical
commission, its main advisory body,

956
00:53:53,341 --> 00:53:58,552
to do an investigation of whether
the subsidiaries of TMC are going

957
00:53:58,552 --> 00:54:03,322
to be acting illegally if TMC gets a
license from the US and starts mining.

958
00:54:03,911 --> 00:54:09,882
Um, and the TMC, through its basically
proxy, which is- Yeah … Nauru, the

959
00:54:09,882 --> 00:54:14,602
country that sponsors it, um, went
to court, uh, to try to block this

960
00:54:14,762 --> 00:54:20,281
investigation, and they were successful
in doing so, albeit temporarily,

961
00:54:20,621 --> 00:54:25,352
but temporarily at a critical moment
when it could have lost its license

962
00:54:25,352 --> 00:54:26,732
with the U- with, with the ISA.

963
00:54:27,621 --> 00:54:32,831
Uh, and so, you know, this was a major
issue of discussion, uh, at the council.

964
00:54:33,271 --> 00:54:38,031
Uh, the council decided to, to continue
with the negotiations with the, with the

965
00:54:38,032 --> 00:54:43,161
inquiry, um, in spite of the fact that
TMC tried to actually kill the inquiry

966
00:54:43,161 --> 00:54:45,691
through going to the International
Tribunal for the Law of the Sea.

967
00:54:45,691 --> 00:54:46,821
It's kind of the- Yeah

968
00:54:46,861 --> 00:54:47,911
court of the oceans.

969
00:54:47,922 --> 00:54:52,741
It was set up to adjudicate disputes
between, um, uh, states over

970
00:54:52,742 --> 00:54:56,592
implementation of the Law of the Sea
Convention, and extraordinarily enough,

971
00:54:56,881 --> 00:55:01,221
it does allow… It on- only states can
take cases to the International Sea,

972
00:55:01,311 --> 00:55:04,941
uh, to the International Tribunal for
the Law of the Sea, uh, which can issue

973
00:55:04,941 --> 00:55:08,251
binding orders, uh, with one exception.

974
00:55:08,431 --> 00:55:12,581
And that exception is contractors to
the ISA, private companies or state

975
00:55:12,581 --> 00:55:14,181
agencies, uh, well, private companies.

976
00:55:14,181 --> 00:55:14,962
They- They can't bring it.

977
00:55:15,681 --> 00:55:18,932
They can bring, they can bring
cases against the ISA to the

978
00:55:18,932 --> 00:55:21,321
seabed, to the International
Tribunal for the Law of the Sea.

979
00:55:21,601 --> 00:55:21,881
Okay.

980
00:55:21,901 --> 00:55:23,271
Civil society can't do it.

981
00:55:23,362 --> 00:55:23,482
Right.

982
00:55:23,482 --> 00:55:25,471
Environmental organizations
can't take cases there.

983
00:55:25,481 --> 00:55:26,351
But the contractors can.

984
00:55:26,761 --> 00:55:28,991
Unions can't, you know,
even companies can't, but

985
00:55:29,011 --> 00:55:29,871
contractors- Interesting … can.

986
00:55:30,101 --> 00:55:34,881
And so they use that, I mean, their,
their, their lawyers are very astute.

987
00:55:35,172 --> 00:55:35,202
Yes.

988
00:55:35,351 --> 00:55:39,552
They have been able to manipulate
the ISA, uh, with the, with the

989
00:55:39,582 --> 00:55:43,061
support of the secretary general
and a number of countries, in

990
00:55:43,061 --> 00:55:45,141
particular, uh, in this case, Nauru.

991
00:55:45,621 --> 00:55:50,602
Um, they, they, they, they can, they
understand and, and, and can exploit the

992
00:55:50,602 --> 00:55:54,421
weaknesses in the actual decision-making
structure of the ISA, and there are

993
00:55:54,422 --> 00:56:00,551
quite a few, um, uh, going back to the
'90s and even to the 1970s, hardwired

994
00:56:00,551 --> 00:56:01,791
into the Law of the Sea Convention.

995
00:56:02,311 --> 00:56:08,920
Um, and, uh, you know, they tried to do
it, and they were, they basically The,

996
00:56:09,430 --> 00:56:16,050
um, co- the, the, the contract that TMC
had through n- through its, its subsidiary

997
00:56:16,050 --> 00:56:20,370
Nori with the ISA was set to expire in
June, uh, July rather, of this year- Yeah

998
00:56:20,440 --> 00:56:20,890
last month.

999
00:56:21,500 --> 00:56:26,100
Um, and they got it extended for
another five years because of this

1000
00:56:26,110 --> 00:56:27,919
kind of legal maneuvering that they
were intending- Oh, interesting

1001
00:56:28,099 --> 00:56:30,950
… to, to do at the International
Tribunal for the Law of the Sea.

1002
00:56:31,000 --> 00:56:34,729
And, and so, so again, coming
to the assembly meeting, one of

1003
00:56:34,729 --> 00:56:38,560
the big debates there was about
corporate capture of the ISA.

1004
00:56:38,930 --> 00:56:46,089
You know, it, uh, is the ISA overly,
um, uh, pliant to the interests of,

1005
00:56:46,220 --> 00:56:49,689
of private companies in particular
that want to go mining, you know?

1006
00:56:49,700 --> 00:56:49,720
Yeah.

1007
00:56:49,729 --> 00:56:53,040
And you look at the triggering
of the two-year rule in 2021

1008
00:56:55,110 --> 00:56:59,992
that, excuse me You know, TMC and
its subsidiary Nori demanding to

1009
00:56:59,992 --> 00:57:03,112
get a, a license in 2003, 2004,

1010
00:57:05,192 --> 00:57:10,942
2005, and now going to the US to get
a license and, uh, but wanting to keep

1011
00:57:10,971 --> 00:57:16,641
its contract with the ISA to be sure
that nobody else gets that contract.

1012
00:57:16,731 --> 00:57:17,021
Yeah.

1013
00:57:17,091 --> 00:57:19,701
Or nobody else gets that area- Gets
that area … which they have a contract

1014
00:57:19,702 --> 00:57:22,681
over, because that's the area that
they wanna mine under a NOAA license.

1015
00:57:22,692 --> 00:57:22,712
Yeah.

1016
00:57:22,832 --> 00:57:25,471
Right smack in the middle of the
contract that they have with the ISA.

1017
00:57:25,932 --> 00:57:28,651
And of course, from our point of view is
we, you know, we said to d- countries,

1018
00:57:28,651 --> 00:57:29,702
"You should just cut them loose."

1019
00:57:30,122 --> 00:57:33,242
You know, uh, do not allow,
you know, either terminate the

1020
00:57:33,242 --> 00:57:34,742
contract or do not extend it.

1021
00:57:34,872 --> 00:57:39,031
And- Right … and, and, you know,
this, this con- th- this, this, this

1022
00:57:39,052 --> 00:57:43,781
company is, is, is manipulating this
whole process in ways that are not

1023
00:57:43,791 --> 00:57:49,162
beneficial to the ISA itself, are not
beneficial to the integrity of the Law

1024
00:57:49,162 --> 00:57:52,952
of the Sea Convention, and are certainly
not beneficial to humankind as a whole.

1025
00:57:53,551 --> 00:57:54,482
Um, and- Let me ask you this.

1026
00:57:54,511 --> 00:57:59,852
How can, like, a country like the US, who
hasn't ratified the UN Convention Law of

1027
00:57:59,861 --> 00:58:04,622
the Sea, be able, like, how's, how can the
metals company be able to work with them

1028
00:58:04,622 --> 00:58:08,572
to be able to do, like, in international
borders or even within their borders?

1029
00:58:08,572 --> 00:58:12,252
Can anybody mine within their borders,
their exclusive economic zone borders?

1030
00:58:13,011 --> 00:58:13,381
Yeah.

1031
00:58:13,441 --> 00:58:14,362
Yeah, that's the case.

1032
00:58:14,362 --> 00:58:18,261
Under the Law of the Sea Convention-
Okay … um, you know, it, it, they have

1033
00:58:18,261 --> 00:58:22,611
full sovereignty over exploitation of
mineral resources, i.e. mining, both

1034
00:58:22,611 --> 00:58:28,032
within its 200-mile zones, their 200-mile
zones, but also beyond that in areas of

1035
00:58:28,032 --> 00:58:29,812
the so-called extended continental shelf.

1036
00:58:30,261 --> 00:58:30,501
Oh.

1037
00:58:30,511 --> 00:58:31,511
So you have the internet- I see

1038
00:58:31,922 --> 00:58:34,411
so, and that's, I, I've forgotten
which provision of the Law

1039
00:58:34,411 --> 00:58:35,172
of the Sea Convention it is.

1040
00:58:35,172 --> 00:58:35,452
Right.

1041
00:58:35,452 --> 00:58:35,471
Yeah.

1042
00:58:35,471 --> 00:58:38,462
But generally, that, that could
be up to another 150 miles

1043
00:58:38,462 --> 00:58:39,881
out beyond the 200-mile limit.

1044
00:58:40,172 --> 00:58:43,382
Which, which increases a lot of the
area, too, when you're looking at, like,

1045
00:58:43,382 --> 00:58:47,341
a small island like American Samoa or,
or Marian Islands or things like that,

1046
00:58:47,341 --> 00:58:48,521
where they're targeting right now.

1047
00:58:49,111 --> 00:58:49,521
Yeah.

1048
00:58:49,572 --> 00:58:49,922
Yeah.

1049
00:58:50,111 --> 00:58:52,461
Although, in that case,
again, there's a debate.

1050
00:58:52,462 --> 00:58:54,881
Russia and China have both
challenged the US on this.

1051
00:58:54,931 --> 00:59:00,691
Ch- the US, um, declared its extended
continental shelf, uh, several years ago.

1052
00:59:00,841 --> 00:59:05,532
Um, uh, and basically Russia and
China, and some of the others actually,

1053
00:59:05,532 --> 00:59:08,291
but Russia and China were the most
adamant about this at the ISA meeting,

1054
00:59:08,292 --> 00:59:10,052
saying, "Well, wait a minute, you
haven't ratified the Law of the

1055
00:59:10,052 --> 00:59:12,691
Sea Convention, so you get no right
to an extended continental shelf."

1056
00:59:12,741 --> 00:59:13,021
Right.

1057
00:59:13,471 --> 00:59:13,772
You know.

1058
00:59:13,822 --> 00:59:14,012
Yeah.

1059
00:59:14,012 --> 00:59:15,512
If you don't agree to the… So yeah.

1060
00:59:15,512 --> 00:59:15,782
Yeah.

1061
00:59:16,111 --> 00:59:16,331
Yeah.

1062
00:59:16,622 --> 00:59:16,951
It's true.

1063
00:59:17,001 --> 00:59:17,221
Yeah.

1064
00:59:17,572 --> 00:59:19,611
Can't have your cake and
eat it too at this point.

1065
00:59:19,611 --> 00:59:19,771
That's right.

1066
00:59:19,771 --> 00:59:20,041
That's right.

1067
00:59:20,041 --> 00:59:20,061
Yeah.

1068
00:59:20,122 --> 00:59:20,432
Yeah.

1069
00:59:20,981 --> 00:59:25,764
So, um, so with, with a lot of
these, um- these provisions and these

1070
00:59:25,784 --> 00:59:28,744
updates in, like, from these meetings.

1071
00:59:28,774 --> 00:59:32,674
Where are we now within,
uh, like deep sea mining?

1072
00:59:32,684 --> 00:59:37,184
So according to ISA, my understanding is
there's still a moratorium and a mo- uh,

1073
00:59:37,213 --> 00:59:41,344
there's more momentum towards a moratorium
than anything else after this meeting.

1074
00:59:41,344 --> 00:59:41,923
Is that correct?

1075
00:59:42,793 --> 00:59:44,133
Yeah, I think that's correct.

1076
00:59:44,234 --> 00:59:44,634
Yeah.

1077
00:59:44,693 --> 00:59:45,033
Yeah.

1078
00:59:45,033 --> 00:59:45,144
Okay.

1079
00:59:45,144 --> 00:59:49,154
I mean, the, the- they're still far
apart on most of the key issues,

1080
00:59:49,173 --> 00:59:51,073
the, the, the negotiators at the ISA.

1081
00:59:51,574 --> 00:59:54,324
Uh, they're realizing it's not
gonna be economical to mine.

1082
00:59:54,873 --> 00:59:59,543
Um, you know, the ISA risks, uh,
uh, uh, uh, operating at a loss.

1083
00:59:59,543 --> 01:00:02,414
But more importantly, too, it's, you
know, th- there are other things.

1084
01:00:02,454 --> 01:00:06,853
There, there's, the, there's, the,
there's, the, the, the, there's continued

1085
01:00:06,863 --> 01:00:12,883
discussion of what the ISA should
charge companies that want to mine- Yeah

1086
01:00:12,893 --> 01:00:13,863
in terms of royalties.

1087
01:00:13,893 --> 01:00:14,133
Right.

1088
01:00:14,143 --> 01:00:17,363
And as well as, uh, some other things.

1089
01:00:17,373 --> 01:00:20,723
So for example, one of the big
topics of debate has been a so-called

1090
01:00:20,724 --> 01:00:22,473
environmental compensation fund.

1091
01:00:23,084 --> 01:00:29,063
Uh, the idea being that, um, uh,
that, that if something goes wrong

1092
01:00:29,664 --> 01:00:34,653
a- and the contractor goes bankrupt,
uh, and the sponsoring state can't

1093
01:00:34,694 --> 01:00:36,164
cover the damage, the cost- Yeah

1094
01:00:36,164 --> 01:00:40,173
of the damage, uh, that, that's occurred,
then there has to be a fund, a kind

1095
01:00:40,173 --> 01:00:44,813
of a last resort fund established by
the ISA, paid for by the contractors-

1096
01:00:44,813 --> 01:00:50,013
Yes … or, you know, you know, funded by
the contractors before any mining starts.

1097
01:00:50,883 --> 01:00:54,753
And the view generally is twofold.

1098
01:00:54,764 --> 01:00:59,864
One, that fund has to be well endowed,
uh, because the ch- the, the, the, the,

1099
01:00:59,944 --> 01:01:01,814
the potential for something to go wrong.

1100
01:01:02,293 --> 01:01:03,623
Uh, well, three things actually.

1101
01:01:03,624 --> 01:01:06,934
The first, the potential for something
to go wrong is gonna be higher at the, as

1102
01:01:06,934 --> 01:01:10,353
the industry starts up- Right … rather
than, you know- Yeah … if, if it

1103
01:01:10,353 --> 01:01:13,724
does start that they could iron out
some, some of the problems or whatever.

1104
01:01:14,404 --> 01:01:21,804
The second is That, um, the, the,
the, but, but in the meantime,

1105
01:01:21,864 --> 01:01:26,034
well, so s- but secondly, that
would be a fund of last resort.

1106
01:01:26,724 --> 01:01:32,594
Uh, and the, both the contractor and
the s- the sponsoring state, who is

1107
01:01:32,613 --> 01:01:36,653
equally responsible for, uh, together
with the ISA, for ensuring that a

1108
01:01:36,654 --> 01:01:40,914
contractor actually abides by the
regulations, follows the rules, um,

1109
01:01:41,394 --> 01:01:45,764
would be liable for any damages, um,
and they have to be well insured.

1110
01:01:46,123 --> 01:01:46,494
Mm-hmm.

1111
01:01:46,523 --> 01:01:49,953
And this is, this is, I think one of
the, one of the side effects of this

1112
01:01:50,253 --> 01:01:55,214
is that from, from what I can see, is
that a number of insurance companies

1113
01:01:55,264 --> 01:01:57,953
are, have basically come out and said,
"We're not gonna insure this industry."

1114
01:01:58,284 --> 01:01:58,634
Right.

1115
01:01:58,643 --> 01:02:01,533
"Because we have no idea what the cost
of this insurance will be." It's true.

1116
01:02:01,533 --> 01:02:03,934
"We don't know how, know,
know how to price this." Yeah.

1117
01:02:03,953 --> 01:02:04,253
You know?

1118
01:02:04,303 --> 01:02:09,124
And the third element is, and this is
part of this debate, is would this fund or

1119
01:02:09,124 --> 01:02:16,103
the insurance, or both, only require, uh,
uh, a, sort of a, to, to, uh, be able to

1120
01:02:16,314 --> 01:02:19,123
clean up whatever damage occurred- Yeah.

1121
01:02:19,253 --> 01:02:23,093
Yeah … or would it also require
compensation to other ocean users-

1122
01:02:23,254 --> 01:02:25,783
Yeah … or coastal communities
or coastal states for loss- Yeah

1123
01:02:25,793 --> 01:02:27,443
… economic losses to their businesses?

1124
01:02:27,883 --> 01:02:31,253
You know, so you could see, for
example, you know, whale watching

1125
01:02:31,254 --> 01:02:34,263
industries- Mm-hmm … the fishing
industry, you know, the, uh, um,

1126
01:02:34,333 --> 01:02:36,044
turtle conservation societies- Yeah

1127
01:02:36,044 --> 01:02:40,624
and so forth, you know, if these species
or if the fish were impacted by the mining

1128
01:02:40,624 --> 01:02:44,053
and this caused e- economic losses to
these industries that have been built

1129
01:02:44,053 --> 01:02:47,354
around these- Yeah … um, would it also
compensate, have to compensate for those?

1130
01:02:47,354 --> 01:02:51,744
And I think, and I think this is
where what, what I said earlier,

1131
01:02:51,823 --> 01:02:54,713
uh, to what Andrew Thaler said was,
was like, this is where we can do it

1132
01:02:54,714 --> 01:02:57,203
right, is to put in these, these…

1133
01:02:57,604 --> 01:03:00,834
A- as much as we don't want, I, I don't
want to see deep sea mining happen, we

1134
01:03:00,834 --> 01:03:04,073
put in these provisions to make sure
that the people who are gonna be affected

1135
01:03:04,073 --> 01:03:06,363
the most are gonna be taken care of.

1136
01:03:06,413 --> 01:03:09,694
I mean, we saw that with the BP
oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

1137
01:03:09,913 --> 01:03:09,954
Mm-hmm.

1138
01:03:09,964 --> 01:03:12,613
How many people it affected,
how many industries it affected

1139
01:03:12,873 --> 01:03:14,693
beyond the oil and gas industry.

1140
01:03:15,003 --> 01:03:17,733
You know, we saw, you know, I, I
lived down there for a little bit,

1141
01:03:17,753 --> 01:03:21,214
and we saw, you know, fishers that
were affected, ecotourism that was

1142
01:03:21,214 --> 01:03:22,933
affected, tourism in, in general.

1143
01:03:23,273 --> 01:03:26,123
Um, you know, it was a
big proportion of- Yeah.

1144
01:03:26,123 --> 01:03:26,963
Yeah … of that area.

1145
01:03:26,964 --> 01:03:29,543
And it's still being, you know,
we're still- Yeah … finding studies

1146
01:03:29,553 --> 01:03:32,863
that show, that continue to show
damage, and we're more, you know,

1147
01:03:32,863 --> 01:03:35,173
almost 15 years, uh, past that.

1148
01:03:35,343 --> 01:03:39,424
And so- Yep … uh, I, I think
every regulation, if you look at

1149
01:03:39,424 --> 01:03:43,623
any regulation, uh, that's written
in Canada and US anyway, there's

1150
01:03:43,623 --> 01:03:45,784
always a, a, a, a development fund.

1151
01:03:45,873 --> 01:03:47,683
Like, there's always a
fund to pay for damages.

1152
01:03:47,684 --> 01:03:49,964
If you're gonna damage an environment-
Mm … you're gonna have to pay for

1153
01:03:49,964 --> 01:03:53,084
something that will make it better
or make somewhere else better.

1154
01:03:53,483 --> 01:03:56,643
Um, even then, there's always, there's
always contradiction within there.

1155
01:03:56,654 --> 01:04:00,126
But At least they have to, they have,
they're responsible, they're held

1156
01:04:00,126 --> 01:04:03,946
accountable to, to the payment of,
of what damage they're gonna cause

1157
01:04:03,946 --> 01:04:05,336
and who they're going to affect.

1158
01:04:05,706 --> 01:04:10,816
Um, one of the things that I've noticed
in, in, um, uh, the negotiations or at

1159
01:04:10,836 --> 01:04:14,836
least even the public comment period
for the American Samoa and Northern

1160
01:04:14,836 --> 01:04:17,636
Mariana Islands, like there were a
lot of people, like a majority of the

1161
01:04:17,636 --> 01:04:21,516
people, like more than 90% of the people
who said, "No, we don't want this."

1162
01:04:21,775 --> 01:04:22,255
That's right.

1163
01:04:22,415 --> 01:04:26,055
And, and, and they decided to extend, you
know, the, the result is the government,

1164
01:04:26,056 --> 01:04:29,466
is the US government decided to extend
the, the, the area that they could mine.

1165
01:04:29,645 --> 01:04:30,275
Like that- Yeah.

1166
01:04:30,275 --> 01:04:33,236
Yeah … like almo- more than doubled
it or even doubled it, which is insane.

1167
01:04:33,236 --> 01:04:34,485
I saw your podcast on that.

1168
01:04:34,495 --> 01:04:34,705
Yeah.

1169
01:04:34,705 --> 01:04:35,083
It was crazy.

1170
01:04:35,083 --> 01:04:35,335
It's insane.

1171
01:04:35,335 --> 01:04:36,525
I didn't realize that either.

1172
01:04:36,626 --> 01:04:36,966
Yeah.

1173
01:04:37,115 --> 01:04:40,055
They're saying everybody like, you know,
68,000 people said no, and there's like

1174
01:04:40,056 --> 01:04:42,085
three people who are like, "Yeah, we
don't mind." And then they're like, "Oh

1175
01:04:42,085 --> 01:04:45,705
yeah, we're gonna double the area." It's
like, it doesn't make sense, you know?

1176
01:04:45,705 --> 01:04:48,655
And it, it's showing that they're,
they don't care about what the people

1177
01:04:48,655 --> 01:04:50,565
say, and they're just gonna go ahead.

1178
01:04:50,576 --> 01:04:54,455
And, and I think what's, what's
really revealing here, Matthew, is

1179
01:04:54,455 --> 01:04:58,115
what you mentioned, is it's, it's
sh- it's showing that it's not

1180
01:04:58,115 --> 01:05:00,376
gonna be very economical, you know?

1181
01:05:00,446 --> 01:05:04,355
And I've heard other things where
even if, if you start mining today,

1182
01:05:04,425 --> 01:05:08,435
that those metals will not get into
production for like another 50 years,

1183
01:05:08,445 --> 01:05:09,935
like from a commercial standpoint.

1184
01:05:10,625 --> 01:05:13,415
And so I just… And with
the, the way the batteries are

1185
01:05:13,415 --> 01:05:14,905
changing and evolving- Oh, yeah.

1186
01:05:14,905 --> 01:05:18,205
Yeah … for EVs, it, it looks like
we're not even gonna need these

1187
01:05:18,205 --> 01:05:20,075
types of metals in the long run.

1188
01:05:20,525 --> 01:05:25,445
Um, so it seems like, you know, maybe
it had a chance 15 years ago, uh, when

1189
01:05:25,515 --> 01:05:29,405
all these things were developing, but it
seems like it's, it's kind of past its

1190
01:05:29,405 --> 01:05:33,745
point of, of, uh, really like, like- Yeah

1191
01:05:33,745 --> 01:05:35,855
of actually producing something, you know?

1192
01:05:35,866 --> 01:05:36,166
Yeah, that's right.

1193
01:05:36,195 --> 01:05:37,426
It's, it's do by date.

1194
01:05:37,445 --> 01:05:38,186
Du-due date.

1195
01:05:38,265 --> 01:05:38,515
Yeah.

1196
01:05:38,866 --> 01:05:39,845
When they, when they call it
the, you know, it's, it's-

1197
01:05:39,845 --> 01:05:41,676
Yeah … it's expired, is what it is.

1198
01:05:41,676 --> 01:05:41,932
It's expired.

1199
01:05:41,932 --> 01:05:42,129
Yeah.

1200
01:05:42,129 --> 01:05:44,205
It's like, it's like
spoiled milk, you know?

1201
01:05:44,355 --> 01:05:46,876
As a business plan, you know,
it's, it, it's out of date.

1202
01:05:46,885 --> 01:05:47,355
Yeah.

1203
01:05:47,365 --> 01:05:47,776
It's expired.

1204
01:05:47,776 --> 01:05:48,045
Yeah.

1205
01:05:48,115 --> 01:05:48,175
Yeah.

1206
01:05:48,256 --> 01:05:51,056
So like, so I guess the question-
Well- … to you is, to, to ask f- to,

1207
01:05:51,716 --> 01:05:54,795
for you is like the Metals Company,
obviously they've had a lot of investment.

1208
01:05:54,795 --> 01:05:57,995
They have this priority to try and
mine and, and they're probably getting

1209
01:05:57,995 --> 01:06:01,215
a little bit more, more desperate,
you know, in terms of trying to do

1210
01:06:01,216 --> 01:06:05,486
this by circumventing the ISA and, and
so to speak, and go through the US.

1211
01:06:06,798 --> 01:06:07,877
It's not very economical.

1212
01:06:07,877 --> 01:06:09,558
What's the benefit for them?

1213
01:06:09,558 --> 01:06:12,917
I, I guess they're gonna benefit
from their shareholders and, and

1214
01:06:12,917 --> 01:06:16,067
that standpoint, but from the long
run, like, it doesn't seem like

1215
01:06:16,068 --> 01:06:20,048
a very reliable plan in the long
run for this thing to work out.

1216
01:06:20,707 --> 01:06:21,108
Yeah.

1217
01:06:21,167 --> 01:06:21,917
No, I agree.

1218
01:06:21,917 --> 01:06:26,158
I mean, I think what I've heard a
number of commentators say, and Victor,

1219
01:06:26,228 --> 01:06:31,827
Victor Vescovo one, being one of
them, um, uh, is that they think it's

1220
01:06:31,827 --> 01:06:33,728
a pump and dump exercise basically.

1221
01:06:33,857 --> 01:06:34,217
Mmm.

1222
01:06:34,468 --> 01:06:40,557
That you, you, you pump up the price of
the stock, uh, and then cash out and-

1223
01:06:40,557 --> 01:06:44,267
Right … let somebody else deal with
the, with, uh, the future of the, uh,

1224
01:06:44,267 --> 01:06:45,648
of, of the company and the industry.

1225
01:06:46,228 --> 01:06:49,877
Um- It's interesting … but, you know,
and this is something that, that Barron

1226
01:06:49,877 --> 01:06:51,188
has been accused of doing as well.

1227
01:06:51,197 --> 01:06:51,727
Well- Yeah

1228
01:06:51,757 --> 01:06:56,637
maybe not accused, but he, he bought
into Nautilus Minerals- Yeah … um, for

1229
01:06:56,757 --> 01:07:01,887
several tens of thous- uh, several, yes,
a couple hundred thousand dollars back

1230
01:07:01,917 --> 01:07:09,018
at some point, uh, before he was, uh,
with, uh, TMC, and then, uh, previously

1231
01:07:09,018 --> 01:07:12,318
called DeepGreen, and then sold his
stock for something like $34 million.

1232
01:07:12,667 --> 01:07:16,747
So- Geez … um, and-
This is Barron Trump?

1233
01:07:17,646 --> 01:07:18,006
Pardon me?

1234
01:07:18,066 --> 01:07:19,646
This is Barron Trump, is that
who you're talking about?

1235
01:07:19,646 --> 01:07:20,256
No, no, no, no.

1236
01:07:20,286 --> 01:07:22,226
G- Gerard Barron- Oh, Gerard
Barron … the CEO- I'm sorry.

1237
01:07:22,326 --> 01:07:23,956
Okay … T- uh, of, of TMC.

1238
01:07:24,046 --> 01:07:24,766
Oh, gotcha.

1239
01:07:25,546 --> 01:07:30,186
And so, you know, he, he and, and his
colleagues, I mean, the, the people, you

1240
01:07:30,186 --> 01:07:34,836
know, that are part of the management
of the c- of the, uh, company, um, when

1241
01:07:34,836 --> 01:07:39,585
they went public and they needed Nauru to
trigger the two-year rule, uh, in order

1242
01:07:39,585 --> 01:07:44,636
to be able to effect a reverse merger and
go public on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange,

1243
01:07:45,146 --> 01:07:52,495
uh, which they did in September of 2021,
um, they had to get Nauru to do it because

1244
01:07:52,526 --> 01:07:57,396
country-- investors were, uh, uh, as far
as we could tell, investors were starting

1245
01:07:57,396 --> 01:07:58,785
to get cold feet about the merger.

1246
01:07:58,785 --> 01:08:00,765
The, the, the investors
in the other company.

1247
01:08:00,846 --> 01:08:04,725
It was called a Sustainable
Opportunities Acquisition Company.

1248
01:08:04,725 --> 01:08:04,735
Mm-hmm.

1249
01:08:04,735 --> 01:08:06,966
It was a SPAC, a special
acquisition company.

1250
01:08:07,065 --> 01:08:07,365
Okay.

1251
01:08:07,396 --> 01:08:09,676
Sustainable Opportunities,
n-not acquisition.

1252
01:08:10,355 --> 01:08:15,185
Um, and I won't go into the details there,
but they launched, uh, at $10 a share.

1253
01:08:15,405 --> 01:08:15,685
Right.

1254
01:08:15,685 --> 01:08:20,126
And the share price steadily declined
to, uh, uh, uh, about a dollar

1255
01:08:20,126 --> 01:08:21,935
a share for a number of years.

1256
01:08:21,976 --> 01:08:27,515
Uh, and then when the Trump administration
started to, you know, uh, uh, indicating

1257
01:08:27,515 --> 01:08:33,915
interest in, um, in, uh, uh, seabed
mining, uh, even before that, uh, when,

1258
01:08:33,915 --> 01:08:36,076
uh, you know, um, what's his name?

1259
01:08:36,076 --> 01:08:41,825
Howard Lutnick, um- Yep … whose
company's Cantor, uh, what is it?

1260
01:08:41,955 --> 01:08:47,195
Cantor Fitzgerald, um, had been invested
in TMC, and it became o- obvious that

1261
01:08:47,205 --> 01:08:50,445
he was gonna be, you know, he, he was
one of the chairs of the transition

1262
01:08:50,445 --> 01:08:52,026
team for the Trump administration.

1263
01:08:52,035 --> 01:08:52,156
Mm-hmm.

1264
01:08:52,156 --> 01:08:54,295
And then, of course, became,
uh, Secretary of Commerce.

1265
01:08:54,945 --> 01:08:56,825
Um, the price started going up.

1266
01:08:56,925 --> 01:09:01,085
And then, of course, Trump, uh, execu-
the executive order comes out saying, you

1267
01:09:01,085 --> 01:09:04,925
know, fast-track deep seabed mining, uh,
uh, operations, et cetera and so forth.

1268
01:09:05,485 --> 01:09:09,066
The, the, uh, the, the, the, the price
of the stock has started to climb,

1269
01:09:09,175 --> 01:09:12,075
got up to about $10 a share again, a
little bit more, and then came back

1270
01:09:12,076 --> 01:09:13,515
down again, and so forth and so on.

1271
01:09:13,515 --> 01:09:14,725
So it's been in a lot of flux.

1272
01:09:14,775 --> 01:09:15,085
Yeah.

1273
01:09:15,315 --> 01:09:15,625
Yeah.

1274
01:09:15,635 --> 01:09:17,145
Whether he'll… You know.

1275
01:09:17,175 --> 01:09:21,755
But when he went public, when, when
Barron went public, uh, he had 17

1276
01:09:21,765 --> 01:09:23,685
million shares, uh, in the company.

1277
01:09:23,756 --> 01:09:28,566
Uh, and, uh, so value
was, uh, uh, $170 million.

1278
01:09:28,726 --> 01:09:29,076
Geez.

1279
01:09:29,125 --> 01:09:33,355
Um, uh, so a nice, you know- Yeah … a,
a, a good, good profit there.

1280
01:09:33,685 --> 01:09:38,035
When you take a company public, as I
understand it, I'm no expert on this,

1281
01:09:38,105 --> 01:09:42,196
uh, as a principal of the company,
you can't sell your shares for- Sure

1282
01:09:42,196 --> 01:09:44,955
a certain period of time-
Right … 12 or 18 months or whatever.

1283
01:09:45,015 --> 01:09:49,135
Um, and by the time that, that those
dates came around, the, the share price

1284
01:09:49,135 --> 01:09:52,906
was worth, uh, you know, uh, uh, a,
a, a, a- Back to like- … to a tenth

1285
01:09:52,906 --> 01:09:56,196
of the, of the- Yeah … what it, what
it, what it was when it went public.

1286
01:09:56,446 --> 01:09:56,646
Right.

1287
01:09:56,646 --> 01:10:00,126
But, but coming back to what you
said earlier, for me at least,

1288
01:10:00,126 --> 01:10:07,828
I, I have trouble seeing how you
can possibly mine nodules Right.

1289
01:10:07,858 --> 01:10:11,948
In the sense of doing it in a sustainable
or an environmentally friendly manner.

1290
01:10:12,018 --> 01:10:12,328
Yeah.

1291
01:10:12,328 --> 01:10:16,408
Because in order to even, you know,
the, the, the production targets

1292
01:10:16,428 --> 01:10:21,598
that are discussed at the ISA are 3
million tons dry weight per year, um,

1293
01:10:21,628 --> 01:10:26,138
per, per nodule mining license area,
um, over a 30-year contract, which

1294
01:10:26,138 --> 01:10:28,227
is the, the, the agreed period- Yep

1295
01:10:28,247 --> 01:10:29,258
that a contract would run.

1296
01:10:29,848 --> 01:10:34,328
Um, basically it would require mining
somewhere between 8,000 and 12,000

1297
01:10:34,457 --> 01:10:40,788
square kilometers, roughly 5,000 square
miles- Mm-hmm … of, of nodules.

1298
01:10:40,788 --> 01:10:45,247
Strip mining an area of, of 5,000
square miles, 12,000 square kilometers

1299
01:10:45,298 --> 01:10:47,657
in a, in a, in a contract area.

1300
01:10:48,357 --> 01:10:53,588
Um, and the contract areas for nodules
are, that are issued by the ISA are

1301
01:10:53,588 --> 01:10:56,278
roughly 75,000, uh, square kilometers.

1302
01:10:56,278 --> 01:10:57,167
They're a little bit less.

1303
01:10:57,168 --> 01:10:59,267
You, you can get up to
75,000 square kilometers.

1304
01:10:59,688 --> 01:11:00,068
Yeah.

1305
01:11:01,208 --> 01:11:04,537
None of the nodules-- The, the
nodules aren't evenly distributed,

1306
01:11:04,618 --> 01:11:06,737
uh, across a, a, a claim area.

1307
01:11:06,737 --> 01:11:09,227
They're in sort of strips
or clumps or aggregations.

1308
01:11:10,438 --> 01:11:14,237
And so you would end up mining, say
several hundred to maybe a couple

1309
01:11:14,247 --> 01:11:18,348
thousand, uh, tons here, and then
another 500 tons there, and so forth

1310
01:11:18,348 --> 01:11:22,718
and so on, until-- I'm sorry, a
couple thousand square kilometers

1311
01:11:22,728 --> 01:11:24,448
to 500 square kilometers, et cetera.

1312
01:11:24,487 --> 01:11:25,507
Well, maybe not even that much.

1313
01:11:25,728 --> 01:11:26,048
Yeah.

1314
01:11:26,118 --> 01:11:26,667
I take that back.

1315
01:11:26,707 --> 01:11:28,837
Anyway, but you, you would-
Yeah … you would be getting it--

1316
01:11:29,088 --> 01:11:34,027
You would mi- be mining across the,
the, the claim area where the nodules

1317
01:11:34,048 --> 01:11:36,067
were in the highest concentrations.

1318
01:11:36,557 --> 01:11:41,808
And so spreading the impact out across
much, if not most of the, the actual

1319
01:11:41,808 --> 01:11:46,047
75,000 square kilometers, even if you're
only mining 10,000 or 12,000- Right

1320
01:11:46,057 --> 01:11:48,888
square kilometers total-
Yeah … in a 30-year period.

1321
01:11:49,798 --> 01:11:54,027
And what you get out of that, um, you
know, setting the economics aside,

1322
01:11:54,158 --> 01:12:00,697
uh, and the increased costs, uh, that
would be, uh, uh, would, would be

1323
01:12:00,707 --> 01:12:05,947
related to, um, royalty payments and
environmental compensation fund and,

1324
01:12:05,957 --> 01:12:09,987
you know, increased price for insurance
and so forth, is you get a very small

1325
01:12:09,987 --> 01:12:15,767
amount of metal, uh, based on current
global production, uh, terrestrially.

1326
01:12:15,857 --> 01:12:17,797
And let me just bring up
those figures for you.

1327
01:12:17,798 --> 01:12:18,998
I've done these calculations.

1328
01:12:18,998 --> 01:12:22,148
I keep updating them, but
the last time was in 2024.

1329
01:12:23,917 --> 01:12:29,114
And basically, um, let's
see here Bear with me.

1330
01:12:29,224 --> 01:12:29,954
Yeah, no worries.

1331
01:12:30,424 --> 01:12:35,844
So you, you would, if, if, if--
so mining 3 million metric tons,

1332
01:12:35,894 --> 01:12:42,914
I mean, metric tons dry weight per
year, um, would give you about 0.13%.

1333
01:12:42,943 --> 01:12:45,284
Gives you about 30,000
tons, roughly speaking.

1334
01:12:45,403 --> 01:12:47,474
And these are, you know,
I'm, I'm being generous here.

1335
01:12:47,483 --> 01:12:47,793
Yeah.

1336
01:12:48,454 --> 01:12:51,063
Because you got to subtract the amount
of, you know, the, the, their, their,

1337
01:12:51,104 --> 01:12:56,334
their, the, you know, the, the, the,
the, the, the percentages in the nodules

1338
01:12:56,364 --> 01:13:00,974
in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone are
roughly very similar, plus or minus 20%.

1339
01:13:01,194 --> 01:13:01,394
Gotcha.

1340
01:13:01,403 --> 01:13:04,143
Um, they, they differ a lot when
you go over to the Cook Islands,

1341
01:13:04,144 --> 01:13:06,363
for example- Yeah … or the central
Indian Ocean, some of these other

1342
01:13:06,363 --> 01:13:09,724
nodule, uh, ar- areas where, where
there's some interest in nodule mining.

1343
01:13:10,203 --> 01:13:14,244
But basically you get 30,000 tons
of copper, which is approximately

1344
01:13:14,244 --> 01:13:19,783
0.13% of what is mined, was
mined terrestrially in 2024.

1345
01:13:21,326 --> 01:13:25,166
You would get, and I'm being generous
here, 36,000 could get, let's put

1346
01:13:25,166 --> 01:13:31,516
it that way, 36,000 tons of nickel,
which is 0.8%, so less than 1% of

1347
01:13:31,516 --> 01:13:33,586
what was mined terrestrially in 2024.

1348
01:13:34,215 --> 01:13:37,545
And for cobalt, uh, you
could get, uh, close to 2%.

1349
01:13:38,226 --> 01:13:42,186
I calculate roughly 5,000 to
6,000 tons of cobalt out of

1350
01:13:42,195 --> 01:13:47,115
three million tons of nodules, or
about 1.9%, uh, of the, uh- Right

1351
01:13:47,236 --> 01:13:49,255
of the amount that's
mined terrestrially today.

1352
01:13:49,646 --> 01:13:53,665
And if you actually-- And, and that's,
that's, that's primary production

1353
01:13:53,675 --> 01:13:55,005
terrestrially I'm talking about here.

1354
01:13:55,015 --> 01:13:55,035
Yeah.

1355
01:13:55,045 --> 01:14:00,235
If you add in the fact that a lot
of the copper, cobalt, and nickel

1356
01:14:00,236 --> 01:14:03,785
on the market today is actually
recycled- Yeah … which means you're

1357
01:14:03,785 --> 01:14:09,065
putting even a lower percentage of
new material, uh, on the market, uh,

1358
01:14:09,085 --> 01:14:10,735
based on what's currently available.

1359
01:14:10,745 --> 01:14:15,646
So in the US, I, I've not found global,
uh, statistics on this, but you-- looking

1360
01:14:15,646 --> 01:14:21,686
at, um, US Geological Survey commodity
statistics, uh, for the US, about roughly

1361
01:14:21,695 --> 01:14:26,655
25% of the cobalt on the market is
recycled or, or from scrap, 35% of the

1362
01:14:26,665 --> 01:14:30,755
copper the same, and 54% of the nickel,
interestingly- Wow … on the, on the

1363
01:14:30,756 --> 01:14:32,625
market is either scrap or recycled.

1364
01:14:32,625 --> 01:14:35,495
Scrap being leftover from
production of steel, for example.

1365
01:14:35,495 --> 01:14:37,485
You still got a whole pile
of nickel left over and, uh,

1366
01:14:37,936 --> 01:14:38,955
and so you're gonna reuse it.

1367
01:14:39,675 --> 01:14:45,436
Um, so all this is to say it's a, it's
a huge area that you're gonna impact on

1368
01:14:45,436 --> 01:14:51,105
the seabed itself and just above it in,
in a, in a, in a far larger area that

1369
01:14:51,105 --> 01:14:56,155
will suffer some impact in the water
column as a result of the discharge of

1370
01:14:56,155 --> 01:15:01,365
the, um, of the wastewater sediment and
mining fines that are pumped back off the

1371
01:15:01,375 --> 01:15:05,545
boat after you bring the nodules up to
the surface, um, a- and onto the boat.

1372
01:15:05,625 --> 01:15:12,436
And, and, uh, you know, you're
contributing a very small

1373
01:15:12,436 --> 01:15:14,165
amount to global supplies.

1374
01:15:14,296 --> 01:15:21,775
And why, so why, you know, what is
the benefit- Yeah … of, of even any

1375
01:15:21,775 --> 01:15:25,565
mining at all for nodules in- if you
need to mine at least three million

1376
01:15:25,565 --> 01:15:30,115
tons a year to make it economically-
Viable … viable according to the ISA.

1377
01:15:30,915 --> 01:15:35,435
Um, and those numbers have been
challenged at the ISA itself.

1378
01:15:35,435 --> 01:15:37,985
They were- Yeah … they were numbers
that came up from, uh, that, that

1379
01:15:37,986 --> 01:15:41,525
were the, the, the e- economics
estimates of the ISA were done by

1380
01:15:41,525 --> 01:15:45,186
a, a team at, uh, Massachusetts
Institute of Technology Right.

1381
01:15:45,356 --> 01:15:48,436
So MIT And so, you know,
so yeah, uh, uh, some guys.

1382
01:15:48,436 --> 01:15:53,326
And, and basically what they were trying
to do is in effect make it look as,

1383
01:15:53,396 --> 01:15:55,385
as attractive to the ISA as possible.

1384
01:15:55,675 --> 01:15:55,906
Right.

1385
01:15:55,915 --> 01:15:59,726
Uh, and one of, one of the ways they
did that was to basically say, um, you

1386
01:15:59,726 --> 01:16:03,345
could convert the manganese into a very
high value manganese, something like-

1387
01:16:03,415 --> 01:16:07,045
Yeah … 99 point something percent
pure, but the market is limited.

1388
01:16:07,135 --> 01:16:07,375
Right.

1389
01:16:07,385 --> 01:16:10,026
And the price elasticity is huge.

1390
01:16:10,036 --> 01:16:13,575
You know, after the third or fourth
mining operation, putting that much

1391
01:16:13,795 --> 01:16:17,335
high value manganese on the market
is gonna d- decrease the price.

1392
01:16:17,505 --> 01:16:17,795
Yeah.

1393
01:16:18,005 --> 01:16:22,116
Uh, and, and- S- … and similarly with
the economics, uh, b- but the, but the

1394
01:16:22,116 --> 01:16:24,875
other-- the, the flip side of this is,
yeah, and similar with the economics,

1395
01:16:24,915 --> 01:16:28,625
if you are going to-- if you're looking
at deep seabed mining to substantially

1396
01:16:28,625 --> 01:16:31,956
contribute to global supplies, and
I've done the same calculations for

1397
01:16:31,956 --> 01:16:39,581
the, um Um, uh, the, um, uh, IEA,
the, the International to- no, the

1398
01:16:39,581 --> 01:16:42,651
International, ugh, IEA, Energy Agency.

1399
01:16:42,661 --> 01:16:42,942
Yeah.

1400
01:16:43,712 --> 01:16:45,421
Uh, I, I don't think I
got that right actually.

1401
01:16:45,422 --> 01:16:48,001
No, it's not the International…
Anyway, we're looking at their

1402
01:16:48,001 --> 01:16:51,541
projections of demand of cobalt,
copper, and nickel for 2030 and 2040.

1403
01:16:51,682 --> 01:16:55,861
And, uh, and you get even less,
uh, uh, deep seabed mining would

1404
01:16:55,861 --> 01:16:59,001
e- per, per mining license would
contribute even less- Right … uh,

1405
01:16:59,001 --> 01:17:00,672
uh, to, to global supplies there.

1406
01:17:01,172 --> 01:17:07,212
So if you're looking-- So in order to
actually substantially, uh, increase

1407
01:17:07,212 --> 01:17:10,191
global supplies, and I take your
point on batteries, for example.

1408
01:17:10,201 --> 01:17:10,531
Yeah.

1409
01:17:10,591 --> 01:17:12,232
They're phasing out cobalt-
Right … and nickel.

1410
01:17:12,681 --> 01:17:16,541
It's, it's lithium iron phosphate-
Yep … has replaced manganese nickel

1411
01:17:16,561 --> 01:17:20,971
cobalt or manganese nickel, uh,
aluminum- Yeah … uh, uh, batteries.

1412
01:17:21,001 --> 01:17:23,751
And now there's a whole s- new
slew of technologies coming

1413
01:17:23,751 --> 01:17:26,211
online or materials technologies-
Yep … coming online for batteries.

1414
01:17:26,532 --> 01:17:31,272
But if, so, but you would have to
mine so much of the seabed and impact

1415
01:17:31,272 --> 01:17:35,232
so much of the water column in order
to make a significant contribution,

1416
01:17:35,661 --> 01:17:36,871
not replace terrestrial mining- Right

1417
01:17:36,871 --> 01:17:37,361
but just maybe add 10% or 20%, uh, to
the amount that would be terrestrially

1418
01:17:42,631 --> 01:17:45,952
mined, that it's, it, it, it's,
it's first of all, it becomes

1419
01:17:45,952 --> 01:17:49,891
even less economical because the
impact on prices would be huge.

1420
01:17:50,282 --> 01:17:55,321
Uh, but it's, it's also sacrificing
so much of, of the seabed, so much

1421
01:17:55,322 --> 01:18:01,022
of the biology and ecology of, of
the deep ocean, uh, for limited- For

1422
01:18:01,022 --> 01:18:01,972
limited, yeah … potential gain.

1423
01:18:01,981 --> 01:18:04,172
You know, you think, "Okay, what
is-" Just doesn't make sense.

1424
01:18:04,331 --> 01:18:07,312
"What is the societal calculation
here? What is the ethical

1425
01:18:07,322 --> 01:18:08,331
approach here?" Exactly.

1426
01:18:08,331 --> 01:18:10,111
"Do we really need to do this?" You know?

1427
01:18:10,201 --> 01:18:10,941
Exactly.

1428
01:18:10,971 --> 01:18:14,621
Um, you know, have we not learned from
300 years of the Industrial Revolution

1429
01:18:14,621 --> 01:18:18,832
that going into whole new frontier areas
and, and, and strip mining, uh- Yeah

1430
01:18:18,841 --> 01:18:22,471
… these areas or clear cutting these areas
without knowing what the ecological

1431
01:18:22,471 --> 01:18:26,391
impacts would be, and only waking up 50
or 100 years later and saying, "Oops.

1432
01:18:26,462 --> 01:18:27,341
Boy, that was a mistake."

1433
01:18:30,451 --> 01:18:31,761
Now we're gonna try to reverse this.

1434
01:18:31,761 --> 01:18:31,781
Oh, true.

1435
01:18:31,781 --> 01:18:31,841
You know?

1436
01:18:31,841 --> 01:18:31,891
So.

1437
01:18:31,922 --> 01:18:32,262
Yeah.

1438
01:18:32,262 --> 01:18:33,231
No, absolutely.

1439
01:18:33,241 --> 01:18:33,262
Yeah.

1440
01:18:33,262 --> 01:18:34,011
Absolutely.

1441
01:18:34,011 --> 01:18:37,661
And the other thing is with the ISA is,
and this is, this is-- I, I won't go

1442
01:18:37,661 --> 01:18:39,521
into the detail because it's so esoteric.

1443
01:18:39,541 --> 01:18:42,011
It, it's not that esoteric,
but it's, it's hard to explain

1444
01:18:42,591 --> 01:18:44,591
without a, a, a lot of time.

1445
01:18:44,591 --> 01:18:44,726
Of course.

1446
01:18:44,726 --> 01:18:49,150
But ba- but basically you have, for
example Sitting on the council of

1447
01:18:49,170 --> 01:18:52,540
the ISA, you have, uh, ab- about
20 countries that are sponsoring,

1448
01:18:53,130 --> 01:18:57,640
uh, either themselves or private
companies for exploration licenses.

1449
01:18:58,010 --> 01:19:02,790
China, Korea, Russia, Japan, I won't
say all 20 of them, but, uh, India,

1450
01:19:02,850 --> 01:19:09,920
Germany, uh, France, UK, Belgium,
Poland, Nauru, Tonga, uh, Cook Islands,

1451
01:19:10,139 --> 01:19:12,910
Jamaica, uh, Singapore, et cetera.

1452
01:19:13,659 --> 01:19:17,140
The ISA has got a real weakness
in its decision-making process.

1453
01:19:17,219 --> 01:19:21,479
Um, and I won't go into the detail
here, but basically if… And this

1454
01:19:21,479 --> 01:19:24,529
is the way-- And I've, and I've been
going to ISA meetings for 12 years

1455
01:19:24,529 --> 01:19:28,329
now, since 2014, and just seeing how
the whole decision-making process

1456
01:19:28,329 --> 01:19:33,060
work independent of its environmental,
uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, regulations,

1457
01:19:33,169 --> 01:19:34,550
uh, in this case for exploration.

1458
01:19:34,559 --> 01:19:38,999
But if they all want-- If the first
companies go and make a profit, let's

1459
01:19:39,000 --> 01:19:44,304
say it does become economical The e-
the economic pressure, the, the, uh,

1460
01:19:44,304 --> 01:19:49,193
uh, uh, on the ISA to open up more
areas for mining, by private companies

1461
01:19:49,273 --> 01:19:53,483
teaming up with developing countries
to get explo- e- exploration licenses,

1462
01:19:54,044 --> 01:19:59,534
by states deciding to get in, uh, uh,
into the game, will be so great that

1463
01:19:59,534 --> 01:20:04,824
it's impossible to imagine that the ISA
could say to, to, to China, "Okay, China,

1464
01:20:04,833 --> 01:20:06,833
you're gonna have to wait until 2031.

1465
01:20:06,843 --> 01:20:07,754
Belgium, you're next.

1466
01:20:07,754 --> 01:20:10,143
You get a license in 29, uh, 2029.

1467
01:20:10,763 --> 01:20:12,943
Uh, UK, come back in 2038.

1468
01:20:13,343 --> 01:20:18,494
You know, uh, Nauru, you know, uh,
next year," et cetera and so forth.

1469
01:20:18,843 --> 01:20:21,353
If they all want to get
licenses, they'll get them.

1470
01:20:21,353 --> 01:20:24,963
The political pro- pressure and in
particular the economic pressure, if the

1471
01:20:24,974 --> 01:20:27,223
big money pours into this industry- Yeah

1472
01:20:27,223 --> 01:20:30,454
if TMC makes good money, gets
bought out by one of the big name-

1473
01:20:30,503 --> 01:20:33,583
Yeah … uh, mining companies, and
they start pouring billions into

1474
01:20:33,583 --> 01:20:36,534
developing the technology and billions
into building the infrastructure

1475
01:20:36,534 --> 01:20:38,773
to, to go do this, all bets are off.

1476
01:20:38,773 --> 01:20:42,014
The economics will likely drive
the development of that industry.

1477
01:20:42,134 --> 01:20:42,424
Yeah.

1478
01:20:42,564 --> 01:20:46,193
You know, the ISA may be able to
place some constraints around the

1479
01:20:46,194 --> 01:20:48,853
edges of that development, but
basically it's gonna be, you know,

1480
01:20:48,853 --> 01:20:50,544
money talks and regulations walk.

1481
01:20:50,673 --> 01:20:51,053
Yeah.

1482
01:20:51,114 --> 01:20:52,064
No, totally get it.

1483
01:20:52,383 --> 01:20:54,284
Matthew, this has been
absolutely fascinating.

1484
01:20:54,284 --> 01:20:57,533
I think we could probably talk about
this for another two, three more hours.

1485
01:20:57,753 --> 01:21:01,904
But, uh, I'd love to invite you back,
uh, to talk more about deep sea mining,

1486
01:21:01,904 --> 01:21:03,664
but also just the deep sea in general.

1487
01:21:03,664 --> 01:21:05,293
This has been a
fascinating- Yeah … chat.

1488
01:21:05,573 --> 01:21:08,833
Um, and we really appreciate you,
you coming on the episode and, and

1489
01:21:08,843 --> 01:21:12,463
being able to, uh, chat with us and
give us updates on what's happening.

1490
01:21:12,463 --> 01:21:16,854
I think it's, it's very informative to
see, uh, the future or maybe not the

1491
01:21:16,854 --> 01:21:21,093
future of deep sea mining, uh, based
on these, on these new revelations.

1492
01:21:21,103 --> 01:21:22,924
So thank you so much for, for joining us.

1493
01:21:22,924 --> 01:21:24,683
We really appreciate it and looking
forward to having you back on.

1494
01:21:25,364 --> 01:21:25,713
All right.

1495
01:21:25,713 --> 01:21:26,424
Thank you, Andrew.

1496
01:21:26,424 --> 01:21:30,663
A, a pleasure, uh, talking with you and,
uh, I, I'm be happy to come back anytime.

1497
01:21:30,813 --> 01:21:31,203
Awesome.

1498
01:21:31,393 --> 01:21:31,733
Thanks.

1499
01:21:32,033 --> 01:21:34,453
Thank you, Matthew, for joining
us on today's episode of the "How

1500
01:21:34,453 --> 01:21:35,483
to Protect the Ocean" podcast.

1501
01:21:35,483 --> 01:21:36,584
It was great to have you on.

1502
01:21:36,683 --> 01:21:40,413
So much to talk about, so
much to review and digest.

1503
01:21:40,503 --> 01:21:41,893
I would love to hear from you, though.

1504
01:21:41,893 --> 01:21:44,903
Like, from this interview, it
looks like deep sea mining is

1505
01:21:44,904 --> 01:21:46,643
not sustainable economically.

1506
01:21:46,643 --> 01:21:49,213
We know the environmental impacts,
or we don't know the environmental

1507
01:21:49,393 --> 01:21:52,848
impacts, but we can predict that
they're not gonna be good But just even

1508
01:21:52,848 --> 01:21:55,208
looking at the economics of the whole
situation, it doesn't look like there

1509
01:21:55,208 --> 01:21:56,398
could be a lot of revenue generated.

1510
01:21:56,398 --> 01:21:57,928
And you wonder, what's the point?

1511
01:21:57,938 --> 01:22:02,698
Why is there such a big push to mine these
metals when batteries are getting better,

1512
01:22:02,698 --> 01:22:06,248
they don't require as much of the metals
that are being mined from the ocean?

1513
01:22:06,458 --> 01:22:08,098
They're gonna be made differently.

1514
01:22:08,127 --> 01:22:12,498
Is there really anything that can be done
to stop it, and do we really need it?

1515
01:22:12,498 --> 01:22:15,788
There's a lot of questions around there,
and I would love to hear from you.

1516
01:22:16,008 --> 01:22:17,897
If you're listening to
this on Spotify, comment.

1517
01:22:17,918 --> 01:22:20,708
I'd love to hear your thoughts on deep
sea mining and whether there's a future

1518
01:22:20,708 --> 01:22:24,407
in it from an investor relations point
of view and an economic point of view.

1519
01:22:24,407 --> 01:22:26,607
Obviously, we kinda know the
environment, but I'd love to hear

1520
01:22:26,637 --> 01:22:28,168
your thoughts on that as well.

1521
01:22:28,168 --> 01:22:30,927
And of course, if you wanna hit me
up on my socials, ask me questions,

1522
01:22:31,028 --> 01:22:33,457
those links are in the show notes.

1523
01:22:33,457 --> 01:22:37,447
And of course, the website for Deep Sea
Conservation Coalition will be in there.

1524
01:22:37,447 --> 01:22:40,308
You can get more information on them
and what they're up to, not only

1525
01:22:40,308 --> 01:22:43,748
from a deep sea mining standpoint,
but also from a deep sea trawling

1526
01:22:43,758 --> 01:22:46,867
standpoint, which is a very important
issue that needs to be addressed.

1527
01:22:46,867 --> 01:22:49,517
So this organization has been
working on it for a long time,

1528
01:22:49,598 --> 01:22:50,927
and they're very knowledgeable.

1529
01:22:50,947 --> 01:22:54,428
I think it's great to see Matthew, as
a former fisher, now, you know, being

1530
01:22:54,447 --> 01:22:59,457
a huge advocate for the ocean from a
political and policy advisor standpoint.

1531
01:22:59,597 --> 01:23:02,958
It's just, it's great to see how
everybody who works in and around the

1532
01:23:02,958 --> 01:23:05,777
ocean, or a lot of people who work in
and around the ocean, want to protect

1533
01:23:05,777 --> 01:23:08,337
it, and it just goes to show that
fishers wanna protect it as well.

1534
01:23:08,567 --> 01:23:10,307
So yeah, that's the episode for today.

1535
01:23:10,328 --> 01:23:13,407
All the links for Deep Sea
Conservation Coalition will be in here.

1536
01:23:13,408 --> 01:23:16,688
Hopefully, Matthew will come back one
day to update us on more of their work,

1537
01:23:16,697 --> 01:23:18,128
especially from the trawling standpoint.

1538
01:23:18,258 --> 01:23:21,668
Again, I would love to hear from you,
but that's it for today's episode of

1539
01:23:21,717 --> 01:23:23,108
the How to Protect the Ocean podcast.

1540
01:23:23,148 --> 01:23:24,177
I'm your host, Andrew Lewin.

1541
01:23:24,188 --> 01:23:24,827
Have a great day.

1542
01:23:24,828 --> 01:23:26,787
We'll talk to you next time,
and happy conservation.