THE USE OF GIS IN RESPECT TO DEEP SEA MINERALS

PROJECTPresenter: Seruwaia VasukiwaiDeep Sea Minerals ProjectOcean & Islands ProgrammeSOPAC Division of SPC

OUTLINE DEEP SEA MINERALS PROJECT

DEEP SEA MINERALS DATA

PURPOSE OF THIS MARINE GEOLOGICAL SURVEYS

WHAT TYPE OF DATA IS AVAILABLE CHALLENGES

CONCLUSION

DEEP SEA MINERALS PROJECT

Deep Sea Minerals (DSM)Project is funded by the European Union under the 10th European Development fund for a period of 4 years

DSM project started in 2011

The project has four key result areas:

Manganese nodule

Seafloor Massive Sulphides

Cobalt-rich Crust

1. Development of Regional Legislative and Regulatory Frameworks (RLRF) for offshore minerals exploration and mining

2. Formulation of National policy, legislation and regulation

3. Building national capacities

4. Effective management and monitoring of offshore exploration and mining operations.

• The project is implemented in fifteen Pacific Island Countries

Deep Sea Minerals Data

Introduce the Japan/SOPAC marine minerals surveys from 1985 to 2005 There were 12 countries surveyed

Nauru, Timor Leste and Palau – Not in the survey Palau – CRC – Data sourced from the USGS

.Mineral Resources

Stage 1 (1985 -1999) Stage 2 (2000 – 2005)

Phase 1(85 – 89)

Phase 2(90 – 94)

Phase 3(95 – 99)

Phase 1(00 – 02)

Phase 1(03 – 05)

Manganese Nodules

Cooks (1985 & 1986) Kiribati (1987 & 1989)Tuvalu (1988)

Cooks (1990) Samoa (1990)Kiribati (1991)

Cooks (2000)

Niue (2003)

Cobalt-rich Crusts

Kiribati (1987 & 1989)Tuvalu (1988)

Samoa (1990)Kiribati (1991)

Marshall (1996 & 1998)FSM (1997)

Marshall (2002)

Kiribati (2003)FSM (2005)

Seafloor Massive Sulphides

PNG (1992) Solomon (1993)Vanuatu (1994)

Tonga (1995)Fiji (1999)

Fiji (2001) Fiji (2004)

Objectives Mineral Resource Potential Upgrade Mineral Resources;Baseline Environment Survey

To assess the deep seafloor mineral resource potential in selected areas of the Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) of twelve PICs

Purpose of this marine geological surveys:

04/29/13

What Type of Data is Available – Survey Reports

Survey Reports Photographs of Manganese Nodules

Seafloor Topography

Metal Concentration

What Type of Data is Available – GIS Files

Cook Islands

HOW THE DATA WILL BE PRESENTED

Regional Marine Minerals Database (RMMD)

Apart from the data we have of the countries, we encourage that if countries have other existing or recently acquired DSM data – if we could have this also projected together with the existing data we already have

Link: http://geonetwork.sopac.org/geonetwork

Purpose of the RMMD

Purpose:

Act as a back-up Data Repository System – Maintaining Data Confidentiality

One-stop shop for any information relating DSM in the region

Progress:

All Deep Sea Minerals Data and Metadata will be part of the RMMD – work in progress

RMMD will be part of a larger data repository system (PACGEO) that is currently being developed in partnership with Geoscience Australia and UNEP/GRID

Up and Running 2014

CHALLENGES• The main challenge in Geoferencing these data from

different countries is the different UTM’s used by different countries in the Pacific thus making it hard to geoferencing each point as we need to convert it to the standard UTM before projecting/ overlay on to Google earth

• Continuation of georeferencing of points for the member Pacific Island Countries

• Preparing all dataset and data to be transferred to the RMMD in the near future

CONCLUSION