marine mining

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Similar SMS deposits lie on ocean floors around the world, particularly in the Arctic and along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Those areas, however, are at far greater depths.

Soil Machine Dynamics is designing and assembling a tool that has a rotating cutting head — like the machines used to hew coal out of underground seams — surrounded by a giant suction pipe. The company describes the equipment as "a novel design for recovering ore which is found in massive sulphide deposits in rugged terrain. It draws on technology developed in recent projects for trenching systems." The two sea-floor mining systems will suck up 1.5 million tonnes of ore annually.

Mr Trebilcock said the operation would cause far less environmental damage than a similar-sized onshore mine. "There's no disturbance to the site around the mine," he said. "We'll have no waste rock. Everything we take up will be smelted.

"We have carried out an environmental impact study, which will be published this year.

"Oil and gas (companies) disturb a far larger area when they open up a new field. The dredging industry takes millions of tonnes off the ocean floor. We have significant (environmental) advantages over land-based companies."

However, some environmental groups, including WWF, are concerned that underwater mining will harm vast tracts of the seabed. "These sites have limited physical integrity and great biodiversity," Simon Cripps, director of WWF's global marine program, told Chemistry World magazine. "We would like to see a thorough, independent impact assessment before any mining work begins."

Catherine Coumans, a co-ordinator at Mining Watch Canada, has been to Papua New Guinea to examine the impact of mining. "I have studied mines … where the tailings (wastes) are flushed out to sea or simply dumped in rivers," she said. "(Papua New Guinea) has, tragically, some of the worst forms of mining and disposal. Now it is going to have experimental undersea mining.