Gerard Barron, Chairman and CEO of The Metals Company, plans for his company to mine the seabed for nickel, cobalt, and manganese in the Clarion Clipperton Zone of the Pacific Ocean. The Maersk Launcher research ship is shown behind him on June 8, 2021, when the vessel returned to San Diego after conducting environmental impact studies on the ocean floor as part of the research to see the effects mining will have on the environment. Credit - Carolyn Cole—Los Angeles Times/Getty Images
Annual meetings of obscure international bodies to discuss the intricacies of maritime law in waters beyond national jurisdiction are not exactly must-see-TV. But this year I am paying very close attention to the International Seabed Authority’s (ISA) general assembly in Jamaica (and online, due to pandemic travel restrictions) which concludes tomorrow. After all, the fate of the world’s oceans, or at least a significant chunk of them, is at stake. So too is the future of batteries for electric vehicles.
Top of the agenda last Friday was a discussion over whether or not the small Pacific island nation of Nauru should be allowed to start mining for minerals that are vital for EV batteries, like cobalt and nickel, which are found on the ocean floor in international waters off the coast of Mexico, some 6,000 miles away. The area, called the Clarion Clipperton Zone, is strewn with enough cobalt-packed polymetallic nodules to power some 4.8 billion electric vehicles, according to industry...
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