To fulfill the green energy transition’s great thirst for batteries to store renewable energy, mining companies are eyeing the floor of the deep ocean.
There they hope to extract the huge amounts of cobalt, nickel, manganese and copper the transition requires. But California’s environmental movement is averting its gaze.
A bill introduced in February by California State Representative Luz Rivas of San Fernando Valley would ban mineral extraction from state tidal waters, or the area up to three miles out to sea from the shoreline. No one is mining that seafloor now – and actually no one is doing this kind of seafloor mining anywhere, yet – but that’s precisely why the California Seabed Mining Prevention Act is so named.
“Mining which has mostly been on land in the past is very controversial because it comes with social justice and environmental…