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An image of Psyche, a metal rich asteroid about three times farther from the Sun than Earth (NASA)
Asteroids to Seabeds: Does Sustainability Need More Exotic Mining?
Nations, businesses and entrepreneurs are looking up to space and down to the ocean floor to obtain the minerals and rare earth elements needed to complete our battery-powered transition to greener economies.
By John Heilprin
February 6, 2024
With demand rising for the critical metals used in clean energy technologies, there’s growing interest in the untested technologies that could extract them and increasing concern about the potential environmental impacts in space and the ocean.
Metallic asteroids vary widely in terms of composition but can contain high concentrations of rare metals such as gold, silver, and platinum in addition to more common elements such as iron and nickel. Deep seabeds have polymetallic nodules that typically contain manganese, nickel, copper, cobalt and rare earth minerals, while seafloor hydrothermal vents issue rare earth elements that are dissolved in hot fluids.
Lithium, nickel, cobalt, manganese and graphite are crucial to battery performance, longevity and energy density, while rare earth elements are essential for permanent magnets vital for wind turbines and EV motors. The 2023 Science Breakthrough Radar® anticipates that asteroid resources, including minerals, metals and water, will someday be useful for off-world activities such as space manufacturing, settlements on the Moon or Mars, or refueling for long-duration space missions to the Outer Solar System.
“The large and long-term investments required for the demonstration of asteroid resource extraction have forced space mining companies to adjust their short-term ambitions, for now,” the Radar says. “Nonetheless, the interest in this area raises the need to tackle important questions about how these resources ought to be governed under international law.”
For now, asteroid mining may be viewed in popular culture as something closer to science fiction. But in the past year, NASA’s Osiris-Rex mission sparked hopes among private mining companies by demonstrating for the first time that an uncrewed spacecraft could visit an asteroid and successfully return back to Earth bearing samples.
NASA’s ambitious Psyche mission, launched last year, is set to explore what is believed to be the exposed metallic core of a primordial planet. Between Mars and Jupiter, Psyche orbits the Sun at a distance ranging from 378 million to 497 million kilometers away. The mission also is testing laser-based communication for transmitting and receiving data from spacecraft beyond radio waves.
In another case, Astroforge, a startup company, launched a prototype refinery into orbit with the aim of processing minerals derived from space. It plans to launch another spacecraft this year to check an asteroid’s mining potential. Advocates of such technologies argue that taking asteroid or seabed resources might be better than more land mining on Earth.
A study in October by economists at the Colorado School of Mines and the International Monetary Fund found the clean energy transition could increase the demand for certain minerals more than ever seen before, and that the production of some metals from space could overtake their production on Earth within 30 to 40 years.
“While there is little concern about running out of minerals on Earth, the quality of mineral deposits has decreased,” they wrote. “This makes mining more detrimental to the environment and increases the social cost. Another source of minerals is at the edge of our technical ability: celestial bodies such as asteroids. Better understanding the trade-off between mining terrestrial deposits at higher environmental and social costs and learning how to extract higher-quality deposits on celestial bodies is the goal of this analysis. We line out a research agenda on how mining in Space could potentially contribute to sustainable growth on Earth.”
“A unique tension” between two environmental positives
The Radar, distilling the insights of 848 scientists from 73 countries, notes that harvesting and extraction of minerals from the deep seabed, through submarine mining on an industrial scale, also could assure a supply of metals and minerals essential to the global transition to green energy – particularly with many of the readily accessible sources of these commodities already being fully utilized – but not without potentially high costs to ocean health.
“This would represent an extraordinary investment of technical and commercial resources, mandated by the urgency of climate change. However, the deep seabed is one of the most poorly understood of all the Earth’s environments,” writes Alexander Proelss, a Professor for the International Law of the Sea and International Environmental Law at the University of Hamburg. “Thus, there is also a significant risk that such mining may severely harm a part of the environment that has so far escaped harm from humanity — and that harm could last for thousands of years. We are therefore confronted with a unique tension between two environmental goods.”
Deep sea mining has yet to be firmly established but would depend on robots to scrape and mine manganese nodules, cobalt-rich crusts, nickel, copper, phosphorites and seafloor massive sulfides from the ocean floor. Debated since the 1960s, it has taken on an added sense of urgency as companies seek the raw materials needed to power our cellphones, computers and tablets, and to produce the batteries needed to fuel electric vehicles.
US-based Impossible Metals last year revealed a plan for harvesting polymetallic nodules from the seabed using an autonomous underwater vehicle for “selective harvesting.” The International Seabed Authority (ISA), a little-known UN agency headquartered in Jamaica, would be responsible for regulating how much of the wealth is shared from deep sea mining. The Radar emphasizes the importance of ocean stewardship but calls for both conserving and exploring the mysteries of the deep sea. The issue is a timely one; environmental groups were alarmed by Norway’s vote in January to allow for the exploration of the Arctic seabed on its extended continental shelf.
“Ultimately, there may not be a single yes or no answer when it comes to deep-sea mining, but rather a multi-level process leading to the formation of a rigid and precautionary legislative basis for such activities,” the Radar concludes. “We should accept that the marine environment must be protected, but we might at the same time be forced to accept that deep-sea mining of certain minerals, or in certain areas, may turn out to be unavoidable to fend off the worst of climate change. Thus, we should seek a balanced approach to deep-sea mining, with regulation based on as much well-informed science as possible.”
Many countries and companies are increasingly eyeing resources beneath the sea as a response to declining high-grade deposits on land, the International Energy Agency (IEA) reported, noting that several exploration projects were progressing in the exclusive economic zones (EEZ) of Japan, Norway and Papua New Guinea. Around 30 projects were waiting for the formulation of official rules outside the EEZ by the ISA.
“Machines often cause seafloor disturbance, which could alter deepsea habitats and release pollutants. Sediment plumes, which arise from stirring up fine sediments, could also affect ecosystems, which take long time to recover. Ecosystems in some old test sites have not yet recovered after 30 years,” the IEA report says. “The impacts on biodiversity are largely unknown. Despite the vast opportunities, rigorous assessments would be needed to understand the full extent of environmental damage and develop proper regulatory measures.”
Based on such concerns, Switzerland’s governing Federal Council adopted an official position in June 2023 on the commercial exploitation of the international seabed ahead of its participation in an ISA meeting. Swiss representatives on the ISA Council and Assembly were instructed to support a moratorium on commercial seabed exploitation until there is more scientific knowledge of the impacts and protection of the marine environment can be guaranteed.
While 15 countries had stated their opposition to any commercial use of the area with or without regulations, the Swiss government said the need to protect against ocean pollution and promote sustainable development justified its support for a temporary moratorium on the commercial exploitation of the area.
The ocean covers about 70% of Earth’s surface, however, as of 2023 only a quarter of the global seafloor had been mapped. The part that holds the most mysteries, the deep sea, begins where the light starts to vanish, generally around 200 meters down, and is estimated to cover more than 60% of the planet. “There are few people who ever go down to the deep sea, even though the deep sea is valuable to us,” Lucy Woodall, Associate Professor in Marine Conservation Biology and Policy at the University of Exeter and Principal Scientist at the Nekton Foundation, told the 2023 GESDA Summit. “The deep sea enables our global processes to happen, it does things like act as a sponge to suck up some of that excess temperature that we’re creating through climate change.”
Scientists have traditionally used ships to photograph the depths or to collect samples of marine life, minerals and water. Now, many rely on human-occupied submersibles, remote-controlled deep diving vehicles, programmable robotic vehicles and autonomous underwater vehicles. “There’s lots of competing interests, there’s the opportunity and potential to be getting minerals that are considered important right now from the seabed,” Woodall said. “The challenge we have in the deep sea is that often we don’t have any baselines. We don’t understand what’s there. We know it’s going to be impactful, and we know it’s going to impact on multiple scales.”
Impossible Metals conducts a demonstration of its Eureka 1 autonomous underwater vehicle. (IM)
Where the science and diplomacy can take us
GESDA has been anticipating the future of exotic mining – reaching into the surfaces of asteroids and scraping ocean floors for natural resources – since the first forward-looking Science Breakthrough Radar® and GESDA Summit at Geneva launched in 2021. Experts identified questions of governance, finance and trade, and debated some of the identifiable long-term impacts and links to climate change, clean energy and circular sustainable economies.
The findings in the 2023 Science Breakthrough Radar®
Based on the Radar, here’s where we stand in several important areas:
3.1.2 Renewable Energy
Much of the growth in renewable energy can be attributed to rapidly falling costs, such as the 85% drop in solar photovoltaic energy costs between 2010 and 2020. This has occurred despite the continuation of government subsidies for oil, gas and coal, which may become indefensible as battery technology improves and undermines the argument that fossil fuel-based generating capacity is essential in the absence of wind or sun. Some promising developments in materials science offer hope for increased efficiency with photovoltaics. Radar, page 129.
Anticipation in a nutshell
5-year horizon: Solar overtakes coal in electricity production
10-year horizon: Energy storage innovations grow renewable market share
25-year horizon: Fusion investments begin to pay off
3.1.4 Energy Demand
New designs of cars and skyscrapers reduce the amount of steel and concrete needed, while improvements to recycling systems, and the gradual transition to a circular economy, also reduce the need to manufacture new materials. Radar, page 131.
Anticipation in a nutshell
5-year horizon: Electric cars begin to dominate the new car market
10-year horizon: Buildings standards assist decarbonization goals
25-year horizon: Global energy demand has peaked
3.4.3 Asteroid Belt
A study from 2012 estimated that moving a 7-meter diameter near-Earth asteroid into low Earth orbit would cost about US$2.6 billion and take 6-10 years. A rare earth metal mine has almost comparable set-up costs of around US$1 billion. This study, however, was not extended to potential profitability of such retrieval. We know from meteorites that some asteroids are richer in platinum than any mine on Earth. Radar, page 148.
Anticipation in a nutshell
5-year horizon: Solar System sampling missions arrive home
10-year horizon: Asteroid prospectors get to work
25-year horizon: Planetary protection becomes important
Invited Contribution: Deep Sea Mining
A few years ago, it seemed deep-sea mining was an inevitability. However, an increasing number of national and corporate forces have recently declared opposition. French President Macron publicly argued in favor of a complete moratorium on deep seabed mining. Other countries, including Germany, Australia and New Zealand, called for a “precautionary pause” to allow time for further research on the environmental impacts of mining on deep seabed ecosystems to take place. Some companies publicly said they will not (yet) use commodities sourced from the ocean, notably including the automakers Renault, Volvo, BMW and Volkswagen. Radar, page 168.
5.3.3 Bootstrapping Circular Economies
Anticipation in a nutshell
5-year horizon: Circularity efforts gain momentum on local scales
10-year horizon: The first entirely closed-loop economic processes appear
25-year horizon: Circular economic become more widespread
5.3.4 Sustainable Global Trade
Anticipation in a nutshell
5-year horizon: A race for sustainable energy
10-year horizon: Global agreement leads to supply chain stress tests
25-year horizon: The technology of resilience makes supply chains more sustainable
International Energy Agency: The Role of Critical Minerals in Clean Energy Transitions
