Baron counters that, although scientists have discovered 5,000 new species in the CCZ in 2023 alone, deep-sea life is not as abundant as ecosystems like Indonesia’s rainforests, where many nickel mines operate. He sees it as the lesser of two evils.
“At the end of the day, it’s not that simple. You can’t say no to something. If you say no to this, you’re saying yes to something else.”
Wow Aa
Baron and others argue that this ecosystem destruction is the only way to get the minerals needed to power the clean-tech revolution, and therefore worth the cost in the long run. But Proctor and other researchers behind the report are not convinced. They say that unless we fully invest in a circular economy that thinks more carefully about the resources we use, we will continue to burn the minerals needed for renewable technologies just as we have burned fossil fuels.
“When I heard about deep sea mining, my initial reaction was, ‘Wait, really? We’re going to strip the ocean floor and mine it to make electronics that all the manufacturers are telling us should just throw away?'”
Mining companies may tout the fact that they’re using critical minerals to build clean technology, but there’s no guarantee that the minerals will actually end up there. They’re also widely used in consumer devices, like cell phones, laptops, headphones, and the aforementioned disposable e-cigarette cartridges. Many of these devices aren’t designed to last, much less be repaired. In many cases, big companies like Apple and Microsoft are actively lobbying to make them harder to repair, almost certainly resulting in more devices ending up in landfills.
“Every day I throw my hands up in outrage at the disposable, unrepairable, stupid electronics that are forced upon people with active measures to prevent them from being reused,” Proctor says. “If these are truly important materials, why are they being used in something that will soon become trash?”
The report seeks to position critical minerals in products and e-waste as “abundant domestic resources.” To achieve that goal, we need to revisit the old mantra of reduce, reuse, recycle, with a few additions. The report adds the concept of repairing and rethinking products to the list, which it calls the 5Rs. It also calls for aggressive efforts to extend product lifespans and investments in “second-life” opportunities for technology, like recycling solar panels and batteries at the end of their useful lives. (EV batteries used to be hard to recycle, but cutting-edge battery materials often work as well as new if recycled properly.)
Treasure in the trash
The problem is thinking of these deep-sea rocks in the same framework as fossil fuels: what may seem like an abundant resource now will feel much more finite later.
“It’s a little ironic that we would think it would be easier to go out and mine, potentially destroying one of the most mysterious and remote wilderness areas left on Earth, to get more of the metals that we throw in the trash every day,” Lampe said.
