Minerals Report - International Seabed Authority

The participant from Saudi Arabia recalled their experience twenty
years ago in the Red Sea. He said that during their experimentation with
tailings from mining the Red Sea muds, the tailings were disposed of at
different levels. He said that the tailings were marked with a tracer to
monitor the dispersion of sediments. He pointed out that the scientists
that were involved in the study were not concerned with large sediments
but rather with the ultra fine particles. He said tracing continued for over
one year after the mining experiment, until a good idea of where the
particles settled had been obtained. He suggested that the report of this
experiment might be useful to De Beers Marine. He also informed the
workshop that the report on the study is available at the University of
Hamburg as well as Cambridge University since their collaborators were
associated with these institutions.
In relation to the question on fish counts, Dr. Corbett said that a
very wide body of evidence worldwide suggests that conventional
sampling technology does not work very well for conducting fish counts.
He said this technology has limitations because it introduces biases in the
estimates. He said that with the use of a submersible, a completely new
understanding of the fish in a given area could be established. He said
that the University of the Western Cape completed this study the previous
month for De Beers Marine. He pointed out that De Beers Marine is still
studying the problem, and that their operations might change the mix of
fish in any mining area.
Stating lack of familiarity with the ISO 14001, one participant asked
Dr. Corbett about the implications of this standard, the difficulty De Beers
Marine had with its implementation, and whether these standards could
be incorporated into environmental protection regulations for mining in
the international area. Dr. Corbett was also asked if he felt that the
adoption of these standards for deep seabed mining would ease the
concerns of environmentalists as regards the impact of mining.
In his response, Dr. Corbett said that the ISO provides a kit for
developing a framework for managing environmental impact in any
aspect of an operation. He also said that it is a standard that could be used
for mining in the international area. He said that subsequent to De Beers
Marine going in that direction, a number of other operators off Namibia
have also adopted this standard. In relation to the concerns of
environmentalists as regards the impact of deep-sea mining, Dr. Corbett
said that the IS0 140001 standards provide the outside world an auditable
INTERNATIONAL SEABED AUTHORITY 664