The Norwegian government has announced plans to open up an area of over 280,000 sq. km for commercial seabed mineral activities, in spite of stern warnings from scientists and green groups of potential severe consequences for marine biodiversity.
Petroleum and Energy Minister Terje Aasland announced the plans on Tuesday, saying the Scandinavian nations wants to become a global leader “fact- and knowledge-based” management of seabed mineral resources.
“We need minerals to succeed in the green transition. Currently, the resources are controlled by a few countries, which makes us vulnerable,” he said, referring to minerals such as copper, zinc, and cobalt, of which Norway believes there are millions of tonnes on its continental shelf.
“Seabed minerals can become a source of access to essential metals, and no other country is better positioned to take the lead in managing such resources sustainably and responsibly. Success will be crucial for the world’s long-term energy transition,” said Aasland.
The proposal – which the centre-left minority government coalition will need parliamentary approval for later this year – said environmental considerations will play a key part and extraction will only be permitted if industry can demonstrate sustainability and responsible practices.
However, deep seabed mining is a controversial issue because little is known about deep seabeds, their ecosystems, and the potential impacts on biodiversity mining operations can cause.
A number of countries, including France, Germany, New Zealand, Costa Rica, and Vanuatu, have called for a moratorium or suspension of all seabed mining activities.
The proposal went through a domestic consultation process, with several scientific organisations, including the Centre for Deep Sea Research at the University of Bergen, issuing stern warnings against the government plans, which the Petroleum and Energy Ministry in the end decided to ignore.
The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters also argued against allowing mining extraction until more is known about the consequences, and earlier this month co-authored a statement from the European Academies’ Science Advisory Council (EASAC) on potential impacts from deep seabed mining.
Those included the killing of biota in areas directly mined at, sediments discarded on site being likely to be unable to recover for decades or centuries, and losses in habitat structure potentially leading to indefinite reductions in biodiversity.
“Such impacts may extend from hundreds of thousands to millions of square kilometres if mining approaches its planned scale to recover millions of tonnes of ore from nodules or from CRCs (cobalt-rich ferromanganese crusts), but be more localised in the case of SMS (seafloor massive sulfides),” EASAC said.
The Norwegian proposal was met with criticism domestically as well as abroad, with some noting the announcement was made just a day after the country signed on to the UN high seas treaty to protect global oceans.
Green group WWF called it “one of the worst environmental decisions the country has ever made”.
“WWF strongly condemns the Norwegian government’s decision today to open up 281,000 square kilometres of its ocean … to deep seabed mining in the sensitive Arctic,” WWF said.
“Norway is now likely to be the first nation in the world to start deep-sea mining operations.”
By Stian Reklev – stian@carbon-pulse.com
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