Minerals Report - International Seabed Authority

including current velocities, oxygen levels, and sediment structure and
benthic communities within the Atlantic 1 Mining License Area. Effective
environmental management required that this had to be developed.
DBM commissioned the Environmental Evaluation Unit of the
University of Cape Town to conduct an independent initial baseline study
in 1991 although this was not required under Namibian law at the time.
This study was completed during 1996, and the results incorporated into
an Environmental Impact Assessment that contained the results in a
legally required Environmental Management Programme Report,
submitted to the government of the Republic of Namibia in 1997. The
team that conducted the project was comprised of thirteen specialists. A
further 16 researchers from the departments of Geology, Zoology,
Oceanography, Environmental and Geographical Science and the Centre
for Marine Studies at the University of Cape Town, the JLB Smith Institute
of Ichthyology at Rhodes University, and Resource and Environmental
Services cc, the Two Oceans Aquarium and the Institute for Maritime
Technology in Simon’s Town assisted.
The key specialist studies investigated the effects of mining on all
potentially affected areas:
� The surrounding sea – the influence on seawater of
discharging sediment produced from the mining process
overboard, and on the bottom waters resulting from the activity
of mining tools;
� The seabed and resident biological communities – the effect
of removing and returning seabed sediments, and the
consequences for the communities of organisms living in these
sediments;
� Fish and marine mammals – the presence of mining operations
on their distribution and behaviour;
� Birds in the Orange River estuary – the consequences of
frequent flights over the area.
INTERNATIONAL SEABED AUTHORITY 628