Deep Sea Mining: Balancing Resource Demand and Ocean Conservation

[Applause] [Music] in the middle of the Pacific Ocean an

ambitious Expedition has set out to explore the deep sea going where no human has ever gone

before where enormous deposits of minerals lie dormant can Humanity benefit from this

untapped source of wealth the technology to harvest it already exists the first prototype of a deep sea

collector for the treasured Stones is called patania it's being tested at a depth of

several thousand MERS scientists are monitoring its deployment because what is technically

feasible may actually destroy a delicate underwater world is it worth the risk these are basically batteries in

stone form this is exactly what you need to build a battery there's manganese nickel Cobalt and copper to conduct the

electricity Environmental Protection organizations such as Greenpeace want to prevent deep sea mining at all

[Music] costs it's the last part part of the planet that humans have yet to exploit

for resources are the oceans in danger [Music]

making peace with nature is the defining task of this Century preserving and restoring the ocean's ability to nurture

humanity and regulate our climate will be the defining challenges of this [Music]

decad 71% of the earth's surface is covered by oceans it's the largest habitat on the

planet the oceans serve as an important heat buffer and carbon sink they absorb about

a quarter of man-made CO2 emissions and thus mitigate the effects of climate [Music]

change planet earth needs the oceans to survive they regulate the climate they provide food they provide the oxygen

rebreathe more than 50% of it by the way but the world's oceans are suffering they're ruthlessly being fished

bare the waste produced by an increasingly affluent society is becoming more prevalent in the water

virtually indestructible plastic waste endangers animals and their habitat so-called ocean dead zones are getting

ever larger climate change is also causing sea levels to rise

nevertheless its exploitation continues sand and gravel are being dredged for use as building

materials at this point where we've lost 50% of our ocean 50% of the whales and the fish that lived in the ocean when my

grandfather first started scuba diving after the second world war had disappeared now we're exploring barely

researched places that are still quite inaccessible we know almost nothing of the plant and animal species living

[Music] [Music] there yet we're aware there are

resourcer nodules on the seabed they're made of cobalt nickel manganese and copper just the materials to meet the

rapidly growing demand for Batteries as the world shifts away from fossil fuels getting metals from our planet can't be

done without any environmental impact so what we need to be thinking about is how do we make decisions that cause least

harm to the planet that we're trying to protect in June 2021 the United Nations in New York was focusing attention on

the highly threatened Marine habitat the UN proclaimed an ocean decade to advance the protection and sustainable

development of the world's ocean sustainable development go these challenges should be top priorities for

everyone everywhere welcome to the United decade of ocean science together let us discover the science we need for

the ocean we want thank [Music] you in March 2021 in the midst of the

global Corona a virus pandemic a special ship was docked at the US Pacific fleet's naval base in San

Diego The Vessel the island Pride Was preparing to go to Sea its crew and accompanying European scientists were

going on a special [Music] Mission as part of the mining IMPACT

program the researchers were heading out to exam examine what happens on the seabed during the world's first tests of

a 35 ton underwater harvesting machine called a poly metallic or manganese nodule

collector it's a big project we want to analyze the environmental impact of a manganese nodule collector working in

the deep sea we have quite a few scientific groups on board here this is the first test of its kind

and we're really close to the conditions you might expect from a deep sea mining operation it's very important for the

environmental analyses parameters and standards that need to be developed that's what we're doing

together with so many great scientific groups here a concentration of Europe's

scientific Talent actually we have all the technologies that Marine research institutes offer we've got all

sorts of equipment here all very Hightech yes I'm really looking forward to it now that it's finally getting

underway all kinds of measuring and testing equipment were used during this Expedition including this giant Bobo

Lander which has already been in service for 25 years the landing gear that's that's right but then not for the moon

but for landing on the seabed um so very much like that we will drop it from the ship and mount it with

some different kind of sensors and then it it goes in three fold to 4 km depth and then make a quiet landing on the

[Music] seabed if we want to know what the impact is of deep sea mining which is a

concern to many people also to myself um I think we need good observations observations down there close to where

this mining is going to happen um so that we know better that we can better predict what the impact will be

researchers want to investigate first while industry is ready to dig this advertisement for the Canadian mining

Enterprise the metals company promises a simple solution energy from the Sun and wind is

replacing fossil fuels to power the transition to a sustainable future we need batteries to store this

energy batteries are made from Metals such as Cobalt nickel copper and manganese until now we've been mining

the Earth for them digging deeper and wider for lower quality ores nature disappears humans suffer

Earth suffers but there's another way oh all that's needed are modern

robots but is it that simple the Canadian city of Toronto is where Samantha Smith

lives she's the head of sustainability for the Belgian Mining Company GSR their manganese nodule collector is

undergoing a series of tests in the Pacific we are together globally we are facing a

climate crisis and I think you know there is this increasing recognition around the world that we need to do

something and we need to do something now um that a big part of that is moving towards clean energy so moving away from

from fossil fuels and what that means is that we're moving away from a planet fueled on fossil fuels to one that is

built on metals and minerals because clean metal technology is so metal intensive so far these raw materials

have come from mines on land located primarily in Asia and Africa the work is often destructive and harmful to Nature

the mines are often located in politically unstable countries like the Democratic Republic of Congo where

there's not much respect for human rights the workers often suffer horrendous working conditions s risking

their lives digging metals that fetch prices far greater than the wages they earn industry says getting resources

from the seabed will be far easier uh we have options about where those metals can come from um and we're

exploring one which is going to the seafloor for them and there's a lot of reasons why going to the seafloor

intuitively seems to make some sense and one is we don't need to remove um for and in some cases tropical rainforests

are being removed to get to Nickel we don't need to remove forest or a single tree to get to the metal that's on the

sea Flor nor do we need to move mountains to get to the or or body uh and people don't need to be relocated so

right away those those reasons make a lot of sense um of course that doesn't mean that we can just dive to the deep

sea and and not do it thoughtfully we also have to get the research done so that we understand how to proceed while

minimizing our Environmental footprint can there be deep sea resource collection without causing new

environmental problems the island Pride departed from San Diego for a 6 week expedition to find

out expectations were high our mission is to investigate the environmental impact of all this we know

a lot about this Marine habitat its ecology the animals that live there but not necessarily what the impact will

be when big equipment and machines are driving around on the seabed our objective is simply to

observe analyze and neutrally take measurements so we can present these findings to the public in a

scientifically balanced way science Industry and policy makers all watched the Expedition

closely the findings could have far-reaching consequences as humans move towards the

age of Green Technology the crew and researchers waved farewell as the San Diego Skyline

receded the boat went off into the night off to where some countries and companies would like to develop new

sources for raw materials as quickly as possible to make the ocean a source of mineral

[Music] resources Cape verde's 10 Islands are located around 600 km off the West

African [Music] Coast the country has half a million

inhabitants most of them descended from former African slaves once a colony of Portugal it gained independence in

[Music] 1975 even though Cape ver is considered one of the most prosperous countries in

Africa there's still a lot of poverty for many the sea is the source of life but a look at the coastline in some

places indicates something is wrong here where there were once sandy beaches and now only Stone

Anna Vega works for the conservation organization Luna she also takes people on

[Music] tours Nature has been mercilessly exploited

here the women watch a truck go by loaded with sand from the shore well this truck just bought sand and it

will resell to someone else so they come here take the sand and then uh sell it to the market it's like a small business

it's not a really big company so there are several trucks it's not just only one uh truck

and as you see the beach doesn't have too much sand anymore so the little that there still exist it will be sold

it is uh against the law it's forbidden uh to take uh the sand but the surveillance is very weak that's the big

uh problem uh it's not allowed to take the sand uh although there is not surveillance here but it could be

controlled uh on the road but no one does it the two conservationists look on stunned

to see how these people are illegally stripping sand from beneath their feet another truck is loaded this time

with sand taken from the seabed days ago the sand is sold as raw material for the construction

industry for years this backbreaking job has been the only way for people like Maria to earn a little

[Music] money it's very exhausting and tiring sometimes there's even a danger of

drowning we stand in the water like this it's dangerous but if we don't do this there is no other way for us to earn

money the conservationists seek dialog Anna learned that years ago the

Bay of rabaka was a Sandy Beach covered with Junes nothing of that remains

today Anna says the people digging up the sand know what they doing here isn't right

I've asked her uh how much they earn uh to do this kind of job and I was shocked because each truck it is around 30 to 40

and if they are desperate to sell even € 25 they sell and the driver will sell it around €

1220 uh I even ask if they uh would like to change uh their job to do something else

they said yes if there is opportunity uh they M

away sand has been Tak taken from the Seas for years beaches are disappearing and not just in Cape verie the sand is

gathered in small bouts or with enormous industrial ships from many oceans the impacts are devastating

scientists and conservationists have long warned of degradation of habitats we all consume directly or

indirectly sand or gravel that comes from the oceans this is also a very big problem in the construction industry

worldwide because so much sand and gravel are being taken from beaches including right off the coasts that

entire ecosystems are now changing biodiversity is suffering and entire structures are being eroded and last but

not least organized mafia-like groupings are at work behind the scenes people are forced to transport sand illegally

entire islands are now almost free of sand in order it must be said to enable a construction boo in the globalized

affluent West which should actually have no future at all in this day and age so this is an issue that is causing major

problems in our seas at the moment but hardly anyone knows that in India Africa and all over the

world even in the North Sea sand is being dredged from seabeds descriptions of Sandy seash

Shores no longer ring true [Music] sand typically makes up around 1/3 of

concrete gigantic buildings in desert countries are also made of sand from the sea because desert sand is unsuitable

for building even the sand for Prestige projects such as the artificial Islands

of Dubai comes from the [Music] sea overexploitation has fatal

consequences for coastal areas microorganisms and habitats all over the world

[Music] meanwhile the island pride has headed for an area of ocean known as the claran

clipon zone between Mexico and Hawaii here enormous quantities of poly metallic nodules an estimated 30 billion

tons lie on the sea floor it takes almost 6 days for the island Pride to reach its destination

these devices held the keys to the expedition's success everything had to work the tension was palpable the

researchers played music to help themselves relax this is what's called a deep sea

Lander and inside is a module like this Optical measuring devices or mini electrodes are connected to it they are

these rods that we see here there's a very small tip that I Ally measures the oxygen content in the sediment so the

whole thing is lowered to the seaf Flor and then there is a motor on it that's programmed

beforehand and we then use it to drive these rods into the sediment and measure how much oxygen is

there really high tech right yes definitely yeah it's a challenge for any device

conditions are extreme kilometers below the surface yes it's just turned out that what we

want to measure oxygen levels on the sea floor and their distribution produce different results when you bring them up

on deck and oxygen is something as we know ourselves That's essential many organisms use oxygen and

we see that as an indicator of how much the system is Disturbed if you disturb the substrate a

lot or remove it completely you're taking away a layer that's been deposited over many thousands of years

where AC processes take place you've either stirred it up or gotten rid of it so you already have a chance to see

now from the measurements does that have an effect or does it look exactly the same as it did

before the island pride has made its way to the Belgian license area this is where it was due to join the ship

belonging to the Belgian mining company GSR the boat was there to test patania the world's first machine prototype for

collecting manganese nodules there are a lot of Manganese nodules here you can see on the map

where the marked license areas of the international seabed Authority for manganese nodules are at the moment

these are all exploration license areas where companies or countries have acquired licenses and are looking to see

how many manganese nodules are located there and which parts of the area can be M now we are going to the Belgian

license area Whose license is held by the company GSR and then in two weeks we'll go to

the German license area which is a bit Southwest of there for any of the operations gsrs

person of contact fris Char was also on board he was responsible for communication between the industrial

vessel and the scientists as the tests began in the Belgian life area and it's all a bit like the wild

west areas are marked out on the seabed that certain Nations or companies are allowed to explore such as the Belgian

company GSR here they were already in the working area this meeting was taking place on

the high seas on the loading platform of the Normand energy stood patania able to dive to a depth of several thousand m

[Music] its first dive was being prepared the technical challenge was

formidable the device had to manage the extreme pressure and maneuver the programmed routes

independently connected to the ship by a supply line only as thick as a human arm [Music]

GSR had been developing the patania over many years this smaller model was built a few

years ago now patania 2 was to face its first real test if it passed with flying colors The

Vessel could possibly become a method for commercial seabed mining in the future so batania 2 is a seafloor nodule

collector and I think the easiest way to picture it is to think of a vacuum cleaner so um the vehicle's been

designed to pick up nodules and leave as much sediment behind as possible uh and then bring them um basically collect

them and eventually that vehicle will be collected to a riser which will bring the nodules to the surface but patan 2

was designed to collect the nodules um and initially collected them in a bin at the back of the vehicle um and then

those nodules were deposited uh away from the the vehicle's tracks um at other points in the

[Music] trial Patna was lowered several times into the deep sea to test this new

technology it looks like something out of a science fiction movie meanwhile on the island Pride fris

stayed in touch with his GSR colleagues on the industrial ship and was briefed how to use the manganese nodule

collector for the upcoming dive with everything you need in there so it's easy for you and

very so uh as the survey is quite uh he had to pass this information onto the scientists so that they sensitive

underwater measuring instruments would not collide with patania now with Patna manganese nodule

mining in the deep sea is technically feasible but questions still remained how great are the environmental risks

and are they worth taking [Music] back in Cape Verde on the largest island

of Santiago some of the former sandy beaches are now just Barren Stones all

of the sand has been gathered up and sold Stones mixed with garbage dominate The

Bays this idilic Marine scene has been severely damaged [Music]

the world's third largest population of loggerhead sea turtles lives around Cape verie today the animal is on the red

list of endangered species it's strictly protected but the removal of the sand disturbs habitat vital for their

reproduction an Vega and her conservation organization are committed to protecting the turtles for Anna it's

shocking to see a female struggling over the hot stones and finding no place to lay her eggs yes it used to be a sand

beach but I didn't uh knew this place before I've just heard from from older people and locals who describe this the

place as a sandy beach before Turtles returned to the beach where they hatched to lay their eggs usually it takes 20

years for the animals to reach sexual maturity but much has changed in two decades yes a very pretty sad story

because the C try to Nest here but there is no sand so it came out but unfortunately it has to return to the

Sea it came this morning obviously yeah 7 a.m. contain the

it's really really sad because an animal uh that has born around here maybe I spent 20 years uh more uh try to nest

and when it came out the his uh let's say his house is being completely destroyed by human beings so this is

really sad so I think we have a duty here try to restore uh this place uh in order to promote the C

conservation Anna has a degree in Marine Biology she spent time abroad and realized that something must urgently be

done in her home country to protect the oceans and nature she founded the nature

conservation organization Luna right here in 2013 but now dozens of helpers are

working on projects on the beaches things are really taking off if we want the conservation to be

successful we need to involve locals so we try to get them involved to create them to have like a passion for the

nature for the species and they try to conserve at beginning it was more difficult but now it's easier and every

time easier because you uh we start to have trust of the community they participate and also uh we try to

improve their livelihoods Luna's approach is simple financed by donations Anna tries to generate

awareness by adding a bit of color for example Porto mosquito is the name of this fishing Village on The bayad

Inferno hell's Bay the fishing boats are beached on Stones the sand long shipped

away Anna now walks through the village and she's proud a lot has changed here in the last few months the place has a

new look started doing uh painting it was to do awareness activities regarding the

fishing and seabirds and the locals they like it and we saw it it has a positive way of make people more aware about the

nature conservation so we started doing the paintings about the local biodiversity and we didn't stop yet so

we plan to do more uh paintings to co over uh the village with beautiful painting to attract more people and so

the locals can uh associate this visit with uh ecotourism activities now ocean flora and FAA

decorate the facades of the houses they're a constant reminder of the importance of preservation

[Music] and this famous Marine Explorer plays an important

role visited BYU infer in 1948 uh with two other um colleagues Theodor moo and auspa so they came here

to test an equipment they want the equipment to uh do some recorded uh in a very uh deep uh ocean so we decide to

bring back this memory that was almost lost because the majority of the locals didn't even know who was Jack sto and if

he he was around here Jac Gusto was a legendary ocean Explorer the French diving Pioneer and

documentary filmmaker introduced people to the underwater world like no other [Music]

he brought images of the depths never seen before into the world's living rooms custo wanted to explore the

unknown World Under the Sea and called for the oceans to be protected [Music]

this is the French Atlantic Coast not far from the mouth of the lair River the granddaughter of Jac custo and her

family live nearby after her father's early death Alexandra kusto spent almost her entire

childhood with her grandfather that left its Mark she's very concerned about the state of the

oceans I think if we continue with business as usual where we're over fishing we're polluting we are um

advancing with ideas like deep sea mining we're going to see our oceans disappear and we'll continue to see a

decline and at a certain point you reach tipping points where you have exponential

loss and that's hard to come back from you can't really come back from exponential loss like we can't put covid

back in a bottle you know that the damage is done um once we reach those tipping points with the ocean the damage

will be done we won't be able to reverse it Alexandre says that her grandfather taught her to dive before she could

walk her love of the oceans is his legacy like him she makes documentaries advocates for the preservation of marine

environment and looks for ways to save the oceans I

was because when you're filming it's dusty she wishes she still had her grandfather at her side in addition to

her husband who's there now my grandfather passed away 20 years ago and left a huge void in the world

not just for me and my family but I think it felt like there was this huge J custo shaped hole in the universe after

he died that no one can fill but what I realized is that every time someone tells me I grew

up watching your grandfather he really inspired me I love the ocean now and I want to do something to help protect

it we are finally at a point in time where we can maybe 10 years ago 20 years ago we

weren't we didn't have the Technologies we didn't have the solutions we didn't have the urgency that we have today and

so my hope is that for everyone who loved him and loved his films and loved exploring the oceans with him and that

Discovery and sense of awe and wonder that he brought my hope is that they will harness

that and use it to create change because that is the best Legacy he could could possibly have left

[Music] us on the Cape Verde Islands Anna and her group of helpers have built a

protection area for turtle clutches on one of the remaining sandy beaches educational signs show passes by

the importance of the oceans and the life in them [Music]

this is where the turtles lay their eggs for weeks Luna watches over the clutches of eggs that have been collected here

the organization ensures the baby turtles can hatch safely we are checking uh which Nest uh already hatch because

this is a hatchery where we put the nest that on risk uh by now we have 147 Nest here

so the team uh were checking if they are about to hatch through the conservation we create

opportunities for uh people to have um job so that they can earn some money for their families and also try to create

them to have this passion uh for nature conservation small steps but they make a

difference Jac kusto would likely be happy to see these efforts to conserve Marine wildlife

[Music] [Music] [Music]

endless expanses of bare water stretch beyond the island Pride's helicopter platform

form here stood two lonely ships in the Belgian license area in the claran clipperton zone in the Pacific Ocean

from the deck some of the European scientists watched as the Belgian company GSR piloted its deep diving

high-tech machine from its ship the Normand [Music]

energy now the researchers many measuring instruments and sensors and robots known as rovs were coming into

play lowered 4 and A2 km down into the depths they were positioned around the deployment area on the seabed where

patania was making its way the scientists wanted to know the impact that patania would have on nature

the control room is located on one of the lower decks of the island Pride here the pilots were sitting

staring at their monitors for hours as they controlled the robots on the deep sea

floor there was an overwhelming feeling of being in a different world of course it actually is a corner of the

world that we barely know and everything we're seeing here nobody else has seen before so naturally that's always

exciting scientific history was being made at that moment 4 and a half thousand MERS below the ship extremely

important research was taking place under extreme conditions um isn't yet stying we're now in the process of

deploying many sensors oceanographic sensors turbidity sensors and current sensors on the

[Music] seaoor these were brought down in the huge sub Sea Basket last night and

they're now with the two rovs remotely operated vehicles that are now moving along the seabed

the sensors are being taken out now and positioned along the seabed at various locations hopefully when patania gets to

work they will measure the sediment Cloud it creates as well a sail has appeared on the

horizon green piece's Rainbow Warrior was approaching the Normand energy the scientists were slightly

unnerved everyone was wondering ing what would happen do you have information what is

happening not that much except to say that they make an action so hopefully it's peaceful

one we don't know the only thing Green Peace has emphasized is that it's peaceful a peaceful protest we can only

hope that's what's going on obviously we're not the target that's for sure as soon as we moved away a

little bit they raced away we don't know what they're doing something is happening on the

starboard side and unfortunately we can't see it the Greenpeace activists filmed and

documented their actions themselves they approached the industrial ship and painted risk on its

side it was a protest operation on the high seas the Environmental Protection Organization relies on striking images

and messages in many languages to Galvanize support Greenpeace considers the commercial

exploitation of the deep sea to be a fatal misstep it would be an absolute crime to

assume that the deep sea is a baren desert where you can do a bit of digging from manganes nodules and other ores

without having any impact on this planet that's what people would like to tell you and I don't think the general public

is aware that the deep sea is teeming with life the companies involved in deep sea mining aren't necessarily interested

in revealing the damage that's taking place down there including in the long

term and which animals and ultimately plants such as Plankton are being affected

it's already been proven that CO2 has been bound in the sediments deposited on the deep sea for many thousands of years

that means carbon that originally came from the atmosphere if we disturb and stir up

these sediments then there is definitely a risk that this CO2 this carbon that is currently sequestered down there could

also be released back into the water and ultimately into the atmosphere [Music]

greenpeace's Rainbow Warrior tracked the Normand energy for weeks with the aim of producing images to generate

support let's make the point right now we want to make sure the oceans continue to have the possibility in the next

years the next Millennia to be climate resilient something they can't be if we start digging and destroying the deep

sea floor not just taking out rocks ores and metals but also the biology the life

forms and destroying their habitat because all of this is involved in the climate stability of our oceans and our

planet asking if you haveed any reaction a meeting was held in the conference room on the island

Pride the occasion Greenpeace had issued an invitation to a worldwide International video conference spread

the word I use the social the ngo's objetive was to prevent possible deep sea mining it reported on its concerns

giving arguments why disrupting The Depths must be stopped at all costs before it really gets underway enous

amount of research that needs to happen before we could ever say they also took a swipe at the scientists who were then

researching the effects such an intervention would have Greenpeace said it wasn't genuine science science that

is being done is the right science [Music] pushing

forward that outraged the scientists they said they would continue to carry out neutral research in order

to ultimately provide data and findings that are also used by Environmental Protection

organizations no but he he's a real scientist and he worked on that stuff stuff and so

some of the researchers showed understanding for the protest on the high seas and the concerns of the

Environmental Protection Organization this is a very sensitive issue and everyone has the right to be

concerned and also to protest of course we all try to be very neutral in our analysis and that's certainly correct

but there's always the question of what the science is used for deciding that isn't

job that will be done by the policy makers who will have to develop the regulations what we're trying to do here

is record what could potentially happen if a device like that were to drive around on the

seafloor located in the middle of the Caribbean Sea the island country Jamaica is home to the institution that will

decide whether deep sea mining is permissible [Music]

[Music] the international seabed Authority or Isa for short has its headquarters here

founded in 1994 by the United Nations it's the overarching body that decides what happens beneath the waves so all

the ISA contractors which are a combination of uh different entities some are governments some are private

sector seor some uh uh State research organizations all of them uh have in view eventually the sustainable

exploitation of deep sea mineral resources Isa uh must proceed on the basis of uh

two fundamental conditions one is that we act on the basis of the best available scientific advice through

extensive consultation and the second is that we act on the basis of consensus amongst the member states that make the

decisions that's currently 167 countries including Germany they develop the guidelines known as the mining code

according to which deep sea mining would be possible we have a very unique opportunity here that actually has never

been done before which is that we have a whole new industry that will proceed only when uh regulations have been put

in place usually it's the other way around industry starts uh and then people start to uh

react by trying to find a way to regulate it or to stop bad things from happening or to ensure that good things

happen here it's completely the other way around we will we have an opportunity to get it right before we

even start which is uh unprecedented actually and it's a it's a really great opportunity so really uh it's it's a

it's a very highly transparent organization where everybody has an opportunity to have their say and

provide input into this emerging new industry so this is where the decision is to be made taking into account the

interests of Industry the findings of Science and the concerns of Environmental Protection

organizations nature conservation versus a billion dooll business who'll win in the end

the island Pride was sent out to work in the claran clipton zone it's an area the size of

Europe more than 30 billion tons of Manganese nodules are said to lie on the ocean floor

here it's an enormous treasure and there is no way retrieving it will happen without disturbing the deep sea

floor the these are the results of patan's [Music]

work the heavy machine has stirred up large plumes of sediment what does this mean for the

environment out of the and yes the one we see here is the manganese nodule habitat next to the

tracks of patania where the Disturbed sediment has already settled it's completely covered the manganese nodules

and FAA and what we want to find out now is that what thickness the sediment does

negative permanent damage and what thickness the fauna can possibly [Music]

tolerate it looks as if a snowstorm had passed over the landscape and covered everything in its

way the measuring devices then needed to be brought up to deck for evaluation a process that took many hours

[Music] [Music] the researchers were eager to see what

had been brought up even though the results of the analyses would likely remain unknown for months until they

were fully assessed in the Laboratories of the institutes in [Music]

Europe first we've got to rinse them because saltwater is very corrosive to the electrical components then we'll

download the data and take a look these are the manganese nodules and you can see that they were actually covered

with deposited sediment but because the water is now slashing back and forth here the sediment just washes away but

it doesn't matter because we have to free the nodals from the sediment anyway in order to collect the animals that

live on them you see when you cut the manganese ndil open there's a core material around

which it forms the ndil is made up of metal oxides manganese oxides and then there's copper and nickel and Cobalt in

it as well as traces of other metals and that slowly builds up around the core material that is such a nodule with a

radius of around 4 cm would be close to 2 million years old so the nodules are prehistoric

stones and much of the deep sea fora in the claran clipperton zone are still unknown yeah have a big sample of SE is

a first time that we have a a SE in the Box car so that's nice and it's in a good shape so so it's tce we're going to

have a good analysis with that the biologists and geologists meticulously examined their soil sample

from the deep sea for them it's a real treasure that's not just mud and stone as you can imagine because that's a very

big view of our heritage so that's uh amazing and there is a of Life inside that you cannot see just by your eyes

you need a microscope the French scientist loves looking at the micro fora from the deep

sea in fact she found several tiny animals and was delighted with every single

one it's called PR [Music]

all over the ship tests were being carried out in the Laboratories as well as here in the cold

room everything that had come from the depths was analyzed in detail studying the structure and

activity of microbial communities in the sediment samples is the work of Turkish researcher batuhan

yapan in human history we start to exploit and then see the results and they are generally unfortunately bad for

nature and in the end for us but this time uh we are so excited because we need those resources it looks so because

we consume a lot and this time we will see impacts and maybe this time we can restrain our impact on nature and uh use

those resources in more uh SU sustainable and environmental friendly way uh personally I would rather choose

consume less and I don't buy telephone every two years for example so I would prefer to

reduce if possible reuse and recycle in the end and uh not touch the sea Flor as much as possible but yeah we we will

need it it looks so [Music] Tanya stratman has taken her seat in the

control room as a biologist she was getting the chance to search the deep sea floor for

larger animals working with the robot Pilots no I think this is like a tiny a shrimp Drifting by didn't arouse

much interest at [Music] first we've got a specific list of

animals that we should gather first we still have about an hour to hopefully find a few more starfish and a few

cemon we'll take them too suck them up just like a vacuum cleaner something's happening over

there this is a sponge I think no I think we will just thrust that if we try to uh try to suck it

in put it in the net yes you can I mean that's a perfect idea we can try to have it in the

net Tanya had her eye on the C [Music] anemone the robot found some other

animals on flatter seabed they looked strange it's amazing that animals can live here at all where the pressure is

many hundreds of times higher than at the Earth's [Music]

surface a large sea cucumber was cited the robot's sampling vacuum packed it away

[Music] [Music] [Music]

and then the robot found an unusually large starfish it too landed in the sample bucket destined to find its way

on Deck [Music] [Music]

hours later the robot had finished its search on the seabed and was brought back

[Music] up along with it came the collect ction of

animals the biologist was quite excited yeah I know my animals are old [Music]

there this is really beautiful this is di happy I'm happy about the C cucumber even though I am probably the only one

now the C cucumber goes into the cold room so that my colleague can dissect it tomorrow

morning is it still alive no I don't think they can handle the pressure difference and especially the

temperature difference of over 20° they die on the way up no touch them guys they are

mine they have four empty traps yes I very disappointed it was a special moment for

the other scientists too they were thrilled to hold these life forms from the depths so close to them oh I like it

it's it's beautiful it's yeah it's it's strange it's weird [Music]

um from Outer world but and other [Music] world this is

awesome we have everything that we collected [Music]

almost Tanya stratman knows that Humanity barely has a clue about what lives deep Bel below the

waves all that they knew at the time of their mission was that biodiversity is high in the depths of the claran clipon

zone some experts suspect that despite the adverse conditions deep below the surface there could be greater species

diversity than even on [Music] land it's possible that Tanya stratman

had brought a previously unknown species up on Deck honestly I'm not sure if this is a

new species that's why we're freezing it right now at minus 80° so that my colleagues at The senen Institute can

determine if it is a new species we've just discovered or if it's only one still unfamiliar to me it's possible

that this one only lives in the deep sea or I just don't know it [Music]

yet it was a Time of Wonder and joy aboard the island Pride far away on the islands of Cape

Verde in the Atlantic the conservationists of Luna was celebrating their small

[Music] success in in summer during the nighttime sea turtles come on Shore to

lay their eggs they usually begin reproducing at the age of 20 that's when the females find their

way back to the beaches where they were hatched to lay their own eggs if they're lucky they'll find sand

to dig a hole for their nest [Music] the team from Luna is spending every

night there for 3 weeks they find the nests dig them up and take them to their protected

Nursery there are too many Nest Predators both human and animals alike to let nature take its course without

the help of the conservationists the turtles would have an even greater struggle to survive given their

shrinking habitat there are moments of Wonder every night now at the small

Nursery baby turtles are emerging digging their way out of their sand nests it's a time of joy and

satisfaction for Anna and her team well it's happening the da hatchin so you can see the baby turtle so now we

are going to test the baby turtle to see how strong they are born they're weighed measured and

counted precise records are kept and then they're given a little Head Start The Offspring are carefully

carried close to the Sea so they won't fall prey to anything or anyone on the beach how many are there here 28

28 and now we release them yes we are going to release them and them uh good luck

[Music] stab you [Music]

don't without the dedication of conservationists like Anna and her team things would be much worse for the

turtles in the Atlantic Ocean around Cape ver [Music]

really happy it's always an emotional uh moment and also a moment of hope uh we hope that in 15 20 years uh those little

TS will return to lay their EGS so this give us um the strength and uh hope to continue this uh conservation award

[Music] [Music] but Anna says there is much more to be

done to improve the condition of the oceans the stripping of sand from so many beaches has also affected marine

life just off the coast food sources for fish have dwindled and there are fewer opportunities to spawn the Fishers catch

less and less and need to go ever farther out but Anna is proud of the fact that

fishing here is sustainable it's all about people's individual needs rather than industrial bottom trolling and

hooked lines that extend for kilometers there's no by catch either this boat takes in its Catch of

the Day a tuna this size is enough to feed several families fishing like this doesn't harm

ocean biodiversity but that's not the case everywhere on the high

seas according to the UN food and agriculture organization onethird of all fish stocks are

overfished technically sophisticated large fishing fleets are scouring the oceans

bare catch quas set by politician s often miss their target a huge Fleet of Chinese

industrial fishing vessels Works around the world round the clock at sea for months they load their

catches directly onto cargo ships many billions of dollars in subsidies fuel this harmful plundering

of the oceans you're stuck there Chinese ships like this one are

specially designed to catch squid the animals are attracted by powerful lights at night these boats ply the waters

mainly in the Indian Ocean or work off South America these images taken from space

show light sources off the coast of Patagonia evidence of Chinese ships hunting for

squid the author authorities are all but powerless there are few ways to monitor the waters and even if there are

countries have no Authority outside of their own territorial Waters Greenpeace was monitoring the Indian Ocean for

months in the summer of 2021 they were there to documents over fishing and illegal

fishing in the meantime they've gone back to using drift Nets they were banned 30 Years Ago by the UN but just a

few months ago so in the Indian Ocean we were able to document kilometer long Nets being deployed these are known as

death walls very thin barely perceptible filaments often made of nylon hang for kilometers deep in the

ocean they're left a long time and taken everything that drifts along in the water they don't only net their target

species such as tuna or swordfish Turtles dolphins whales sharks rays and many many other animals that are not on

their lists at all and ultimately only go overboard as unwanted by [Music]

catch the campaign was evaluated at Green Peace headquart ERS the activists have known for a long time that life on

the high seas is like life in the wild west illegal fishing over fishing and destructive fishing practices continue

to threaten ocean life the latest figures from the UN food and agriculture organizations say quite

clearly about 60% of the world's food fish stocks are exploited and exhausted to their biological limit and around 30

or 32 are severely depleted that means more is being removed from ecosystems more fish are being fished in the oceans

then can replenish themselves biologically and [Music]

naturally if too many fish are taken and stocks cannot renew this also affects FS the Fishers like here in the western

Baltic Sea an old father and son fishing company located north of Keel is looking

for ways to secure the future of Germany's smallscale Fishers a study has shown that pod has

almost disappeared and Herring is threatened the staple catches of the Baltic have been overfished for years as

a result the EU has almost completely banned the catch of both fish species Father and Son Maya are able to

continue because they've switched to different species and fish sustainably we've always been Fishers

you could almost say since time immemorial it's our life's and the best job there is look around

Freedom beautiful weather today wonderful no stress no annoying people kind in there for

[Music] invention actually there's not much to laugh about small scale fishes on the

Baltic are becoming a rare species themselves the Myers want to keep working but in their own way with Gil

Nets been I'm one of the longest serving Fishers here on board and as long as I'm allowed

to Pilot a boat with permission from the Fishers trade Association I'll be at the H

kind the Myers also fished Cod and Herring for decades but in the last 20 years they noticed the stocks dwindling

numbers of cod in the western Baltic are so low some scientists doubt they will ever

recover that's why years ago the Meers shifted to only catching fish that are still relatively

plentiful this is Place everybody knows it it's got a white side and it's

annoyingly slippery as smooth as an eel it is and in it

goes we also use a beeping device by the way to ward off porpuses you can also hear it it's quite soft

now there's one here and one at the end they work off each other there's got to be one every 200 M and they scare off

the porpuses so they don't swim into the Nets the Meyers have committed themselves to fishing sustainably and

taking only as much as they need to earn a living nevertheless they still struggle with EU regulations

yeah it's too thin there's no Flesh on it what are we going to do with it why should we take it with us I just don't

get it and we have gloves on the fish have nothing this law applies to fishing with trollers it says we have to take

everything we catch so it's counted towards the quota because they're supposedly dead anyway and that's the

basis for this law we don't get it we're supposed to take it but we won't because why should

I kill it honestly it's such nonsense at least for us the problem with this law is that

fishing with a tler is equated with Gil net fishing that's complete idiocy in my

eyes for the few fish we catch that are too small like this one here we just don't take them we refuse to do

so we're trying to avoid netting smaller fish by using larger mesh our mesh size is 10% larger than

required so we bring in good quality significantly fish our profession is really getting a

criminal reputation that can't be right it can't now things are about to get

bloody industrial trolling led to this large international fishing boats have plied the Baltic for years taking what

the sea had to offer sustainable fishing and selling close to the consumer became the Mayers motto on the fish CA

website by now I'm writing on fish from CA that we want to sell our fish right away what

do we have we have mackerel we have turbit and we have place we won't make 10:00 anymore so we've got to change

that first 11 to1 that just takes a few seconds then it's up on the fish fota site right away let's look

um now it's reloading and there's a new address sh that's where we're about to go to

sell mackerel turbet place until 1: p.m. and in it goes doing the right thing is easy buy

what you can get where you live that leaves us with potatoes and cabbage but that's how we Sav the world that's the

point we don't need huge containers ship do we have one right now there's one coming up behind us they distribute all

the junk from around the world but we just eat what's here and it's a wonderful product

[Music] honestly are the Myers saving the world if everyone behaved like this the oceans

might not be in crisis and neither would the fishing profession [Music]

after the second world war there were 3,000 fishing businesses on the Baltic coast of sches

holin now only a few dozen small Fishers are left who are trying to survive via sustainable giln net

fishing meanwhile large industrial fishing boats with huge Nets continue to fish as if there were no issue

[Music] the Myers have been Fishers for eight Generations they don't know whether it

will go on but if it does then like this we need a mackerel and two plates this one yes that's very nice and

two place yes medium and that would be all for

us all right then that's €1 13 sometimes it really does happen that

we have no fish for three or 4 days when the wind blows across the Baltic and we can't go

out you just have to accept it we're not a supermarket we can only deliver when we catch something

if the fish are threatened so too is the health of the oceans but over fishing is just one

reason why the oceans are in crisis unbridled overexploitation is threatening the Seas Alexandra custo

laments that in the end we will just harm ourselves as well as our environment the granddaughter of Ocean

Explorer Jac custo knows the oceans cover 71% of the planet produce half of our oxygen and absorb huge amounts of

CO2 right now we still have the opportunity to change how we fish to put a moratorium on deep sea mining we have

an opportunity to expand ocean farming in a way that's regenerative with seaweed forests growing around the world

and the restoration of seagrass beds and mangroves and salt marshes we still have a chance to do that in a way that will

actually rebuild our oceans and and bring that life back Alexandra custo has set up a

foundation called oceans 2050 and its aim is to restore ocean habitats she and other ocean

conservation Advocates believe the thoughtless disrespectful exploitation of marine life needs to

end we must make a clear change of course towards Marine protection and a away from exploitation it goes without

saying we use resources from the sea we need them but it has to be at a regulated environmentally sustainable

level we must prevent all the damage we can it's actually extremely late now already in some cases we're 5 minutes

before doomsday and in others 5 minutes after arrival one can only hope that our oceans also have a future because our

future as humans depends on it directly we we are still unacquainted with the depths we're only just

beginning to understand what goes on deep below the surface and the significance these processes have for

life on land the energy transition must take place climate change must be stopped but

is commercial mining in the deep sea worth the risk you know we do need a colossal amount of metal to achieve that

and that metal needs to come from somewhere and by all means recycling is hugely important um and can play a role

but it isn't enough to get us there for decades to come and so new sources of metal will be needed and um for GSR we

you know we're aiming for 2028 as the earliest date for commercial production after a six week Expedition

exploring the deep sea The Voyage of the island pride has slowly come to an end the scientists did a lot of testing

measuring observing and thinking even if many final test results can only be revealed after evaluation in

Labs back home the researchers already knew that the harvesting of the seabed was just about

Unstoppable I believe it will come at some point we want development we want growth we want a high standard of living

and I think think that should be the case for the entire world population for that we will need

metals from that perspective the companies here will always continue continue to research and try to tap into

this treasure here if us Europeans don't do it maybe then people in Asia will but I do

believe that at some point the time will come when this mining will take place those are the trade-offs that we

actually have to make as a society is it worth it to us to destroy our great sustainable system to indulge in this

continued long-term damage that goes way beyond our generation is it worth it to us to wreck that we're talking about

huge areas of seabed if we just continue on with our consumption of these metals and don't

achieve a sustainable cyclical economy we will have completely destroy deep sea areas like the entire claran clipperton

Zone within 50 to 100 years we're talking about an area that's 3,000 by 1,000 km a gigantic area the

size of Europe that we've destroyed and you need to keep that in mind [Music]

[Music] [Music]