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Hi, I’m the writer. I was, obviously, paid nothing by TMC or any other company. If you’re interested I can link all the peer reviewed publications on which I ba

• remarkEon 3y ago
  Why is that the standard for The Economist, if you don’t mind my asking?
  • halhod 3y ago
    I don’t mind at all. The honest answer is I don’t really know. Broadly speaking it helps our voice sound authoritative and readable to not be breaking the flow of a piece up with lots of quotes and citations. But I can assure you I spoke to many people, and read many papers, in reporting the article
    • Zandikar 3y ago
      > But I can assure you I spoke to many people, and read many papers, in reporting the article You keep saying that and not citing them. Please do.
      • nunuvit 3y ago
        It hasn't even been an hour. Chill tf out.
        • Zandikar 3y ago
          I'm aware. Please point to the part where I specified a 1 hour (or any) deadline. They're free to do whatever the damn well please quite frankly, but as they've made multiple assurances that said sources do exists, I was just explicitly stating that we would like those citations. EDIT: And while typing this, they delivered.
          • nunuvit 3y ago
            Deadline? You wrote as if they were stalling or an unreasonably long time has passed, when hardly any time had passed at all.
            • Zandikar 3y ago
              Incorrect. They were waiting for someone to explicitly ask. And I Did. See their comment. You're the one that's reading far too into this and need to chill.
              • nunuvit 3y ago
                I'm not criticizing you for asking. That phrasing is accusational and expresses annoyance, I'm reading it normally.
                • Zandikar 3y ago
                  The author was clearly making a point to make us ask explicitly even after we expressed concerns about their and their publications sources. Yes, I was annoyed by this. You however grossly misinterpreted as me being upset and demanding sources IMMEDIATELY, which wasn't the case. I made a single request to follow up on what the initial commenter in this thread said to reinforce that there are multiple of us in the comments that are highly skeptical of the claims in the paper, especially in light of a lack of byline or citations by the publisher. The author then happily obliged in a timely and respectful manner and addressed my concerns. You, however, are the one that took issue with it.
                  • nunuvit 3y ago
                    I interpreted it normally. It seems you wrote it wrong.
      • halhod 3y ago
        I said it once, and waited for them to express interest. Now you have. Here are some of the papers from which the reporting is drawn: starting point for abyssal biomass calcs - https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2021.671062/full https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2021.6710... more on abyssal biomass- https://www.nature.com/articles/srep30492 https://www.nature.com/articles/srep30492 plant biomass per hectare in Sulawesi - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0378112709004940 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03781... nickel assessment in nori-d for per hectare numbers https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1798562/000121390021033645/fs42021a2ex96-1_sustainable.htm https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1798562/000121390021... I spoke to Kris van Nijen, Gerard Barron, Nathan Eastwood, Adrian Glover, François Mosnier, Pia Heidak, Peter Tom Jones, Mervyn Stevens, Alex Laugharne
        • Zandikar 3y ago
          Much appreciated. This goes a long way in alleviating concerns about this being a paid piece by TMC and gives some insightful credence into the claims about deep water sea life and potential impacts. As I've apparently upset someone else in the comments by asking for citations, I just want to clarify that I didn't intend that as an attack. I'm just a bit incredulous that an organization with as much "prestige" and alleged journalistic integrity as The Economist doesn't - as a rule - cite their sources or byline their authors. Perhaps it's just a different way of doing things, but that really doesn't sit right with me for a number of reasons, and as a result, I have a hard time taking anything it says without a spoonfull of salt/sources. Thanks again.
          • halhod 3y ago
            No problem, happy to help
    • remarkEon 3y ago
      I see. So you’re positing, essentially, two reasons: 1) stylistically it’s annoying to read broken sentences, and 2) The Economist is, ostensibly, an authoritative source and the reader is assumed to, more or less, just trust that they’re doing their homework - and you are here assuring us that your homework was, in fact, done. I’m not sure where you’re at, though I suppose it’s not unreasonable to assume the U.K., so this might be my US bias showing … but when I read something and the primary source is missing or there is insufficient citation (especially on a technical topic) I am immediately skeptical of the argument and my null hypothesis becomes that the piece is pushing a narrative. Perhaps that’s just cynical, but I’ve seen this phenomenon so many times where an article says X and doesn’t actually link the law (or court ruling or whatever) and when I go check it on my own it’s almost comically absurd for one to draw the article’s conclusion from the actual primary source. Of course, I’m not accusing you of doing this at all. Thanks for being a good sport.
      • halhod 3y ago
        yeah you’ve got it. i’m based in London. i am fairly confident that our style can come across as arrogant. i don’t always ageee with it, though i can see its advantages. you’ll see i put a bunch of my sources below for you to check out if you like
        • remarkEon 3y ago
          I wouldn't say arrogant, really. The Economist definitely has an audience, which is in my view an educated urban professional who works in financial service, or maybe tech or tech-adjacent, or something on the periphery of government. So the tone is spot on, in my estimation. I'm probably just a cynical American and am too used to my news media intentionally lying to me, so don't take it personal if my question and/or explanation came off as rude. I did check out the links, thanks for providing them.
          • halhod 3y ago
            no worries at all, did not take it as such. and yeah, i guess i think just cos something has worked well for us for a long time, doesn’t mean it’s not worth thinking about how well it works today
• pxmpxm 3y ago
  > Hi, I’m the writer. I can't be the only one thinking this is pretty phenomenal.
  • vanattab 3y ago
    Happens alot on hacker news actual
• ulrashida 3y ago
  Thanks for getting in touch! While (of course) you're not being directly paid by the company, it remains puzzling how the article comes off so glossy for TMC and seabed mining. This positive tone is present throughout the article and seems to deliberately highlight the case for mining while diminishing the drawbacks and risks. Taken in aggregate, a reader could be left with the impression this is a miracle technology with nearly no problems. A few selections: "With the coming expiration, on July 9th, of an international bureaucratic deadline, that prospect looks more likely than ever." -- oh, those pesky bureaucrats! You've decided to present this as a "get going" or "next step" signal, but the reality may be the provisional approval comes with many more provisions that create further delays. "That date marks two years since the island nation of Nauru..." -- this paragraph omits that there are Draft Regulations that exist and studiously avoids comment on the issues considered and potential ramifications for TMC. It also generously leaves out that Nauru decided to trigger a 2-year timed condition during the pandemic. As a commercially interested party they have a vested interest in weaker regulation. Basic readings from the Journal of Maritime and Coastal Law (fun!) suggest the ISA is concerned about the enterprise. "(The firm itself says it hopes to wait until rules can be agreed)" -- Are you familiar with the phrase "talk is cheap"? This feels like a thumb on the scales for TMC as it exists with no assessment of TMC's trustworthiness on the topic. "tmc’s plan is about as straightforward as underwater mining can be." -- translation: "this is simple stuff" but it's actually not. Even the literature you've cited is replete with caution after caution that this is relatively unknown territory and requires more research to understand. Another thumb on TMC's side -- straightforward is good, right? What are these scientists and bureaucrats going on about? "a second ship which will ferry them back to shore for processing" -- You've picked "ferry" instead of "vessel/ship" which can imply small scale. It appears the destination is not known. "will be released back into the sea at a depth of around 1,500 metres, far below most ocean life" -- that we know of, and, of course, that pesky life on the bottom is way below 1,500 metres. "Three Chinese firms—Beijing Pioneer, China Merchants and China Minmetals--are circling too" -- So we're using TMC's numbers, but do we expect these other firms to have the same level of performance? "It will also kick up plumes of sediment, some of which will drift onto nearby organisms and kill them (though research from mit shows these plumes tend not to rise more than two metres above the seabed)." -- What about the impacts from that sediment release at 1,500 metres? Further, who sponsored that MIT study (hint: quite a few people interested in deep sea mining)? There are multiple studies illustrating the problem of having science focused by sponsors with vested interests. You choose to present the results as-is without tempering them (e.g. "the first study", "an individual study") leaving it to the reader to think about how well developed this knowledge actually is. "companies like tmc can be encouraged to choose locations where energy comes with low emissions. Indonesian nickel ore, in contrast, is uneconomic unless it is processed near the mines from which it was extracted" -- so TMC heeds this encouragement and is presumed to pick an environmentally responsible outcome at the cost of profits, but Indonesia does not have the same opportunity? A few years back Indonesia's polluting smelters didn't even exist. If this is a concern, could they not also be made clean? The article gives the benefit again to TMC and at this point one of the scales is moving through the table. Finally, and most amazingly, we get this gem two-thirds of the way in: "The diversity of life is “very high”, says Dr Glover. Yet in several respects, mining the seabed is more environmentally friendly than mining in Indonesia." -- what a pivot! Every paper cited repeats the same themes: "there's a lot of life down there", "we don't know enough about how important it is, or how to assess it", "more study is needed to understand this" and the article zooms right past to go: "Don't worry folks, we can go by weight per hectare!" No regulatory body in the world does this. Do you have any scientific backing for this ratio in environmental impact assessments? -- deep breath -- My central concern is that the article you've written is by itself relatively benign. It uses an interesting ratio (biomass disturbed) and a bit of fluff from TMC's public disclosures and the nickel market in general. Where it can cause damage is that people will read it and draw conclusions: 1. Sea mining is less harmful (30x!!!) than terrestrial mining. This is not true. The simple answer is that we don't know yet. Trying to model environmental impacts in a marine environment is orders of magnitude more difficult than terrestrial activity. On the surface we can see, instrument, and to some poor extent predict. Underwater it's a whole different ball game. We don't know the receptors. We don't know the transport mechanisms. Unknown after unknown. 2. We need sea mining now! Our back is up against the wall climate-wise and sea mining is what will get us the batteries we need. We don't, we really don't. There's a reason Indonesia is now the dominant supplier (and current temporary reserve leader) -- their government is quite happy to strip their country down for metals and sell them. Market dynamics in isolation often mean that if there is contestable supply and a market participant has a clearly lower cost of participation new supply will not come on. The world is moving in the right direction in so many areas: pricing in externalities like carbon and deforestation, changing to alternate materials (iron based batteries, sand/physical batteries), increased recycling. We don't need to go trash a sea bed because some company says it's a great idea (and look at that NPV). 3. I (the reader) am educated, I know there are risks and unknowns, but for a short while the CCZ seems like an ideal solution to our problems. Maybe, we don't know. What we do know is that once this door is open it's not going to shut. It won't be confined to nickel. It won't stay in the CCZ. Mining as an industry has already learned this lesson -- strong regulation based on well developed science is in the public interest to ensure minerals are fairly priced for the long terms costs they incur. -- other thoughts -- Can you share any insight in how this article was suggested for research? Was it driven by the recent share price run, timing of ISA decisions, or general interest in battery materials? Either way, it looks like it has contributed to some very positive gains for TMC shareholders (~+20% since July 2). Thanks very much for sharing sources -- I concur with other discussion posters that these are increasingly useful in public consumption of analysis. I hope the policy at the Economist changes in this regard, particularly for online content. I'm also fully aware that folks from HN probably won't even see this thread as it's well off the front page. If you've read this far your blood might be a bit up as well. Sorry. My original post was hyperbolic in the extreme and was unprofessional. I'm an engineer, economist, and environmental scientist. I care a lot about the role professionals have to play in guiding an increasingly untrusting public and I also know about balancing industrial and environmental outcomes. I'm telling you to suck eggs, but in the future I hope you can have robust conversations with your editor about tonality and neutrality in publishing rather than falling into the latest hype and narrative that sells. The future of this crazy world might just depend upon tens of thousands of small actions like that. All the best.