WITH GREAT BOUNTY COMES GREAT CONTROVERSY

Time magazine recently ran a feature story by Aryn Baker, that told of vast deposits of metals at the bottom of the central Pacific, in an area that stretches 1.7 square miles between Hawaii and Mexico. The deposits include nickel, cobalt, manganese, and rare Earth metals currently in high demand for craft electric vehicles to replace gas-guzzling cars. By some estimates, the mineral wealth three-miles-deep in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ) of the Pacific Ocean could be worth as much as hundreds of billions of dollars. Some companies and countries have already invested millions in exploring this potential. The metals come in the form of polymetallic nodules that litter the surface of the seafloor. Countries and private companies have been developing te chnologies that could suck up these nodules. Tapping that bounty has generated great controversy because this area is in international waters and the removal of the metals causes environmental harm. In a test plot similar to the CCZ that was harvested in 1989 for underwater nodules, life there has yet to return. Watch for a decision to this controversy as it plays out in international bodies and courts.