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>Surface mining also has environmental consequences which have to be weighed against the costs of deep sea mining. What will actually happen is both types will

>Surface mining also has environmental consequences which have to be weighed against the costs of deep sea mining. What will actually happen is both types will be happily used at the same time, so there's little point in weighting one against the other. Any other rationalization misses the fact that this is an extremely poorly understood environment (especially if we do compare with surface mining). It's never a good idea to tinker with unknown at scale without understanding it first, let alone commercializing it. Mining history is practically written in mistakes like that.

culi 4y ago
Right. Especially as we ramp up our reliance on solar panels (and therefore batteries). These operations are now heavily subsidized and we'll likely be making 100% use of every avenue available to mine as much as possible as soon as possible sigh. If only we put this much funding into solving our exploding e-waste crisis which could also help alleviate the problems of rare metals
- jeffbee 4y ago
  We don't need weird elements to support solar with batteries. Grid stabilization can do fine with lead-acid batteries. Both lead and sulfur are readily available. There are also iron batteries and other emerging battery chemistries, as well as non-battery storage like pumped liquids or pressurized gases.
  - Robotbeat 4y ago
    Don’t need manganese or any rare minerals for batteries. Lithium iron phosphate batteries are used in the least expensive Teslas (base Model 3 and Y), and although lithium is very abundant, you can even substitute it for the even more abundant Sodium with only a slight weight increase. That’s superior to Lead based batteries in nearly every way.
    - pfdietz 4y ago
      Manganese is not a rare mineral. One does not mine manganese nodules for the manganese. Mining them would create an enormous surplus of manganese that would get dumped in waste piles.
      - Turing_Machine 4y ago
        Why is a "waste pile" worse than having it distributed all over the ocean floor?
        pfdietz 4y ago
        I wasn't making a judgment here. I was just pointing out that most of the manganese ends up in the waste stream. One would not be mining these things for the manganese (although what manganese that could be sold would be sold.) In a world mining manganese nodules, the price of manganese would be very low.
  - arcticbull 4y ago
    Or you can reduce your need for batteries by combining wind and solar with green, safe nuclear reactors - and smart grids capable of varying their demand instead of us trying desperately to adjust supply. For example, as more folks move to electric cars, a smart grid would allow chargers to charge less at periods of intense demand. We've historically focused exclusively on adjusting supply to meet demand - which is clearly very difficult and very expensive (especially if you look at gas peaker plants) - but we instead (or in addition) can adjust aspects of the demand curve to smooth out variability in load. This should be easier and significantly cheaper.
    - hedora 4y ago
      Alternatively, keep burning fossil fuels, but overproduce renewables on average, and use the waste energy for carbon capture. (This has the big advantage of buying time to decarbonize things like concrete, cattle and airplanes.)
      - arcticbull 4y ago
        Wouldn't it be more efficient to not produce the carbon than to produce it on one side and capture it on the other?
        jeffbee 4y ago
        Whether something is more efficient might not be relevant. What's relevant is whether there is a path from here to there that keeps us under a survivable amount of climate change. Staying on that path may require some decisions that seem superficially inefficient.
        splistud 4y ago
    - s1artibartfast 4y ago
      Great, if we don't actually need the metals then there will be no one to buy them from the deep sea Miners and the problem will solve itself
- elil17 4y ago
  I don't think it's true that both will be used at once - if deep sea mining is cheap enough, it could make surface mining non-viable. A carbon tax could certainly eliminate surface mining because smelting surface minerals uses so much more energy compared to smelting nodules. We actually put much more funding into e-waste recycling. Allseas most recent funding round was $150m, and they're the only major player in the deep sea mining space. But Redwood materials, one of many e-waste recycling startups, has raised $700m in their most recent round.
- Schroedingersat 4y ago
  Abundant battery chemistries are already most of the way through commercialisation. ZnBr, Sodium/Prussian blue, Iron flow, and Iron air are all proven practial and rapidly scaling. AlS, NaS and LiS are hopeful next steps. The only critical mineral not yet eliminated for the most commercially viable upcoming option is silver which requires about one ounce per net kilowatt with state of the art processes. Unless you meant cheap energy will subsidize mining, in which case you are correct and this is a problem.
- splistud 4y ago

culi 4y ago

Right. Especially as we ramp up our reliance on solar panels (and therefore batteries). These operations are now heavily subsidized and we'll likely be making 100% use of every avenue available to mine as much as possible as soon as possible sigh. If only we put this much funding into solving our exploding e-waste crisis which could also help alleviate the problems of rare metals

jeffbee 4y ago
We don't need weird elements to support solar with batteries. Grid stabilization can do fine with lead-acid batteries. Both lead and sulfur are readily available. There are also iron batteries and other emerging battery chemistries, as well as non-battery storage like pumped liquids or pressurized gases.
- Robotbeat 4y ago
  Don’t need manganese or any rare minerals for batteries. Lithium iron phosphate batteries are used in the least expensive Teslas (base Model 3 and Y), and although lithium is very abundant, you can even substitute it for the even more abundant Sodium with only a slight weight increase. That’s superior to Lead based batteries in nearly every way.
  - pfdietz 4y ago
    Manganese is not a rare mineral. One does not mine manganese nodules for the manganese. Mining them would create an enormous surplus of manganese that would get dumped in waste piles.
    - Turing_Machine 4y ago
      Why is a "waste pile" worse than having it distributed all over the ocean floor?
      - pfdietz 4y ago
        I wasn't making a judgment here. I was just pointing out that most of the manganese ends up in the waste stream. One would not be mining these things for the manganese (although what manganese that could be sold would be sold.) In a world mining manganese nodules, the price of manganese would be very low.
- arcticbull 4y ago
  Or you can reduce your need for batteries by combining wind and solar with green, safe nuclear reactors - and smart grids capable of varying their demand instead of us trying desperately to adjust supply. For example, as more folks move to electric cars, a smart grid would allow chargers to charge less at periods of intense demand. We've historically focused exclusively on adjusting supply to meet demand - which is clearly very difficult and very expensive (especially if you look at gas peaker plants) - but we instead (or in addition) can adjust aspects of the demand curve to smooth out variability in load. This should be easier and significantly cheaper.
  - hedora 4y ago
    Alternatively, keep burning fossil fuels, but overproduce renewables on average, and use the waste energy for carbon capture. (This has the big advantage of buying time to decarbonize things like concrete, cattle and airplanes.)
    - arcticbull 4y ago
      Wouldn't it be more efficient to not produce the carbon than to produce it on one side and capture it on the other?
      - jeffbee 4y ago
        Whether something is more efficient might not be relevant. What's relevant is whether there is a path from here to there that keeps us under a survivable amount of climate change. Staying on that path may require some decisions that seem superficially inefficient.
        splistud 4y ago
  - s1artibartfast 4y ago
    Great, if we don't actually need the metals then there will be no one to buy them from the deep sea Miners and the problem will solve itself
elil17 4y ago
I don't think it's true that both will be used at once - if deep sea mining is cheap enough, it could make surface mining non-viable. A carbon tax could certainly eliminate surface mining because smelting surface minerals uses so much more energy compared to smelting nodules. We actually put much more funding into e-waste recycling. Allseas most recent funding round was $150m, and they're the only major player in the deep sea mining space. But Redwood materials, one of many e-waste recycling startups, has raised $700m in their most recent round.
Schroedingersat 4y ago
Abundant battery chemistries are already most of the way through commercialisation. ZnBr, Sodium/Prussian blue, Iron flow, and Iron air are all proven practial and rapidly scaling. AlS, NaS and LiS are hopeful next steps. The only critical mineral not yet eliminated for the most commercially viable upcoming option is silver which requires about one ounce per net kilowatt with state of the art processes. Unless you meant cheap energy will subsidize mining, in which case you are correct and this is a problem.
splistud 4y ago