Deep sea mining: Exploring the unknowns Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Science and the Arts Brussels – 26th April 2016

DEEP SEA MINING - “Totem and Taboo of Ocean Economy ”* -

Ricardo Serrão Santos University of the Azores & European

Parliament

* Charles Goddard – The Economist

STOA Study 2015

My World Until Yesterday • FP3 – MARFLUX/ATJ - Mid-Atlantic ridge: hydrothermal fluxes at the

Azores triple junction (1993-1996) • FP4 – AMORES - Azores mid-oceanic ridge ecosystem studies: an

integrated research program on deep-sea hydrothermal transfers and fluxes (1996-1999)

• FP5 – VENTOX - Deep-sea hydrothermal vents: a natural pollution laboratory (2000-2003) & OASIS - Oceanic Seamounts: An Integrated Study (2002-2005)

• FP6 –EXOCET/D – Extreme ecosystem studies in the deep ocean: technological developments (2003-2006) & MOMARNET - Monitoring deep seafloor hydrothermal environments on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (2004-2008)

• FP7 – HERMIONE - Hotspot Ecosystem Research and Man's Impact On European Seas (2009-2012) & CORALFISH – Assessment of the interaction between corals, fish and fisheries (2008-2013) & MIDAS - Managing Impacts of Deep-sea Resource exploitation (2013-2016)

• The global area covered by many of deep-sea habitats is still largely unknown and the proportion studied is minimal.

Habitat Area (km2) % deep sea % researched

Deep sea floor 326 000 000 km2 100% 0,0001%

Abyssal plains 244 360 000 km2 75% < 1%

Ocean ridges 30 000 000 km2

(ca. 50 000 km) 9,20% 10%

Seamounts 8 500 000 km2 2,6% 0,25-0,28%

Coral reefs 280 000 km2 0,08% minimal

Hydrothermal fields Approx. 2000 (Unknown area)

Unknown 10% of the 200 hundred know fields

Cold seeps 10 000 km2 0,003% 2%

based on Eva Ramirez-Llodra et al. 2010. Biogeosciences, 7: 2851-2899.

The dimension of our ignorance

• The deep-sea is the major environment on Earth but also one of the least studied. It includes a unique variety of habitats, with a great number of discoveries during the last 50 years.

Eva Ramirez-Llodra, (...) Pedro Martinez Arbizu et al. 2010

The dimension of our ignorance

Deep, diverse and definitely different: unique attributes of the world’s largest ecosystem

Most of Biodiversity Hidden in Hotspots The majority of species that remain to be discovered are likely to be small-ranged occurring in hotspots and less explored areas such as the deep sea.

P Bouchet 2006. The Magnitude of Marine Biodiversity

Yeti crab & Michel Segonzac IFREMER

Antarctic Hydrothermal Vent ca. - 2400 m deep

2009 -2010

Undescribed peltospiroid gastropod surrounding undescribed single Kiwa n. sp. and partially covered by Lepetodrilus n. sp.

An undescribed seven-arm sea star predatory on the stalked

barnacles cf. Vulcanolepas

Unidentified octopus

Rogers et al. 2012 PLoS Biology | Januay, 2012 | vol. 107 | Issue 1

PresenterPresentation NotesFigure 3. Photographs of the ESR vent fauna. (A) Actinostolid sea anemones surrounded by cf. Vulcanolepas on a chimney with diffusehydrothermal venting at E9 (Dive 138, 2,396 m depth). (B) Dense field of actinostolid sea anemones along with peltospiroid gastropods (Dive 140,2,394 m depth). (C) Anemone field at E9 with juvenile Kiwa n. sp. interspersed (Dive 139, 2,398 m depth). (D) Undescribed peltospiroid gastropod atE2 surrounding single Kiwa n. sp. and partially covered by Lepetodrilus n. sp. The pycnogonid cf. Sericosura is at the bottom right of the image (Dive132, 2,608 m depth). (E) An undescribed seven-arm sea star predatory on the stalked barnacles cf. Vulcanolepas at E9 (Dive 139, 2,402 m depth). (F)Unidentified octopus at E9 (Dive 144, 2,394 m depth). Scale bars: 10 cm for foreground.doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001234.g003

Farming Bacteria for Food

This species of yeti crab “farms” colonies of bacteria on its claws. To help them grow, it waves its pincers over methane and sulfide vents, fertilizing the bacteria and making them good enough to eat.

Thurber AR et al. 2011 PLoS one | November 2011 |Volume 6 | Issue 11 | e262431

Carreiro-Silva et al. 2012. Growth rates of long-lived black coral Leiopathes sp. from the Azores. Marine Ecology Progress Series

PresenterPresentation NotesSlide 17 – Vida Extrema: Leiopathes (Coral negro) AçoresLocal de nascimento: Açores.�Ano de nascimento: - 1389 (antes) da Era Comum�Ano da Morte: +2008 da Era Comum�Idade: 3400 anos

- small fluctuations in the rather constant overall percentage coverage (~50%) were explained by subtle changes in hydrothermal activity. - time was shown not to be a structuring factor, - rate of change is (…) slower than that observed on sulfide edifices from faster-spreading ridges in the North-East Pacific.

Rate of change in community dynamics at a slow-spreading ridge

Cuvelier et al. DSRII 2010 & L&O 2011

Ramirez-Llodra E, Tyler PA, Baker MC, Bergstad OA, et al. (2011) Man and the Last Great Wilderness: Human Impact on the Deep Sea. PLoS ONE 6(8): e22588. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0022588 http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0022588

Manganese nodules are among the slowest-forming mineral deposits known: from 1 to 20 mm/million years.

PresenterPresentation NotesExploitation of deep-sea mineral resources. A, theholothurian Psychropotes semperiana over manganese nodules on theKaplan abyssal plain in the Pacific Ocean (Photo courtesy of Ifremer -Nautile/Nodinaut, 2004); B, sampling a vent chimney off Papua NewGuinea during the environmental assessment conducted by NautilusMinerals before exploitation of massive sulphides (Photo courtesy ofNautilus Minerals).

http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0022588

In the ocean depths, there are mines of zinc, iron, silver and gold, that would be quite easy to exploit. — says Jules Verne’s hero Captain Nemo (1870)

PresenterPresentation NotesThe great depths of the ocean are entirely unknown to us. 1870

What passes in those remote depths … we can scarcely conjecture.

Either we do know all the varieties of beings which people our planet, or we do not.

If we do not know them – if Nature has still secretes for us, nothing is more conformable to reason than to admit … of new species, of an organization formed to inhabit strata inaccessible to soundings

First contact between New Guinea highlanders, who had never before seen a European, and Australian mining Dan Leahy, in 1933.

Papua New Guinea - 1933

2013

Papua New Guinea - 2006

China will build 221 cities of 1 million people by 2025 (13 cities per year) where will all the metal come from?

Part of Lisbon

Greater Lisbon has 2.7 million people, so build a new Lisbon every 11 weeks!!

Example from Steve Scott, Canada

Conflict Minerals

• Major driver of the continued violence is Minerals – Tin, Tantalum, Tungsten, and Gold.

• Civilians, many of them children, are forced to work the mines at gunpoint and forfeit any of their findings to the armed forces in control

• Rape and torture of woman are a common weapon used to enforce labor and cooperation in the mines and surrounding towns.

based on: Raising Hope for Congo, by Annie Conzemius et al.

Blood Minerals • Refiners- Metal processing

companies based mainly in east Asia take the Congolese minerals and smelt or chemically process them together with metals from other countries in large furnaces.

• Electronic Companies- The refiners sell Congo’s minerals unto the electronic companies. (Samsung, Apple, Nokia, Nintendo, Canon, Intel….)

• Us (Consumers)

based on: Raising Hope for Congo, by Annie Conzemius et al.

The Rush for Deep-sea Polymetallic Sulfides

Map – Steve Scott courtesy

Courtesy: EMEPC & EMAM, Lisbon, Portugal

The Rush for the Deep-sea Rare Earth/ High-tech Metals

Hein JR 2010. Oceanography, 23 (1)

Papua New Guinea

Fidji Islands

Tonga

Management and conservation of hydrothermal vent ecosystem Sept 2002,Vancouver, Canada

Identifying Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas

We Got the Whole World in Our Hands We Should Give Half of it Back

- Edward O. Wilson

DEEP SEA MINING�- “Totem and Taboo of Ocean Economy ”* -STOA Study 2015My World Until YesterdaySlide Number 4Slide Number 5Most of Biodiversity Hidden in HotspotsAntarctic Hydrothermal Vent�ca. - 2400 m deep�2009 -2010Farming Bacteria for FoodSlide Number 9Slide Number 10Slide Number 11Slide Number 12Slide Number 13Slide Number 14China will build 221 cities of 1 million people by 2025 (13 cities per year) where will all the metal come from?Slide Number 16Conflict MineralsBlood MineralsSlide Number 19The Rush for Deep-sea Polymetallic SulfidesThe Rush for the Deep-sea�Rare Earth/ High-tech MetalsPapua New GuineaFidji IslandsTongaSlide Number 25Management and conservation of hydrothermal vent ecosystem� Sept 2002,Vancouver, CanadaSlide Number 27Identifying�Ecologically or Biologically Significant Areas Slide Number 29Slide Number 30We Got the Whole World in Our Hands�We Should Give Half of it Back�- Edward O. Wilson