Key points
- An international workshop on the Regional Environmental Management Plan for the cobalt-rich crust area of the Northwest Pacific was held in Qingdao on May 28 and 29.
- It was jointly organised by the ISA and COMRA, with experts from the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Russia, Norway and Portugal.
- The workshop sought consensus on the plan’s design and framework and proposed an international cooperation programme to balance mining with environmental protection.
On May 28-29, the international workshop on the Regional Environmental Management Plan for the Cobalt-Rich Crust Triangle Area of the Northwest Pacific was held in Qingdao. The workshop sought to form a consensus on the design of the regional environmental management plan and a preliminary concept for its working framework, and to establish an international cooperation programme on environmental management, so that seabed mineral development and environmental protection can be kept in balance.
The workshop was jointly organized by the International Seabed Authority and the China Ocean Mineral Resources Research and Development Association (COMRA). Experts and scholars from COMRA and from the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Russia, Norway, Portugal and other countries discussed the regional environmental management plan for cobalt-rich crusts in the Northwest Pacific and its outlook. Under the theme of science and institutions, cooperation and sharing, the workshop reviewed relevant policies and laws at the national, regional and international-organization levels, collected and shared environmental baseline data for the area, worked toward consensus on the design of the regional environmental management plan and a preliminary concept for its working framework, and proposed an international cooperation programme.
The Northwest Pacific seamount area is the region with the densest distribution of seamounts in the world and the area where cobalt-rich crust resources are most concentrated, giving it significant scientific research and commercial development value.
Wang Chunsheng, researcher at the Second Institute of Oceanography of the State Oceanic Administration and chief scientist of the West Pacific seamount environment project, explained that seabed mineral extraction can have a major impact on the seabed biological environment, and that lifting seabed minerals to transport vessels also has a certain impact on the upper ocean environment. Before any seabed mining takes place, comprehensive surveys of the seamounts at different water depths and orientations must therefore be carried out, along with environmental impact assessments, to reduce the impact on the marine environment of the mining area. The aim of the workshop was for the parties concerned to reach a preliminary agreement, establish an environmental protection management network and carry out regional functional zoning, so that mineral development and environmental protection are balanced.
As of April 2018, the International Seabed Authority had signed cobalt-rich crust exploration contracts with five contractors, four of whose contract areas (China, Russia, Japan and the Republic of Korea) are located in the Northwest Pacific seamount area; the contractors hold exclusive exploration rights and priority mining rights in their areas. The workshop was organized around three main topics: the legal and institutional framework, seamount habitats and the impacts of human activities, and recommendations for the regional environmental management plan.
