A new website uses ship location data to track deep-sea mining exploration. Mining companies have claimed more than a million square kilometers of ocean around the world and soon—maybe sooner than you think—will begin sending huge robotic diggers to grind up the seafloor and extract gold, copper, manganese, and other metals to feed our growing hunger […]
seafloor mining
Are we ready for the gold rush on the sea floor?
One firm reckons its planned sea-floor mines are more sustainable than those on land. But the diggers could destroy rare life and more. THE submersible Alvin encountered its first “black smoker” 2000 metres deep off the coast of the Galapagos Islands. It was 1977, and the realisation that life could survive in pitch darkness next […]