SEABED AUTHORITY WORKSHOP SUGGESTS FOUR RESEARCH PROJECTS ON MARINE ENVIRONMENT

SEABED AUTHORITY WORKSHOP SUGGESTS FOUR RESEARCH PROJECTS

ON MARINE ENVIRONMENT

(Reissued as received.)

KINGSTON, 5 August (International Seabed Authority) -- A technical workshop convened in Kingston by the International Seabed Authority has developed proposals for research into four scientific issues related to environmental aspects of deep-seabed mining.  The group, which met from 29 July to 2 August, included some 45 participants – among them marine scientists, seabed contractors, and members of the Authority’s Legal and Technical Commission.

The Workshop incorporated into its proposals some of the latest advances in genetic testing, in a project that would use DNA analysis to identify denizens of the deep ocean, much of them still undescribed by science.

The research would be conducted mainly in the Central Pacific Ocean, where most known deposits of polymetallic nodules occur.  The selected topics deal entirely with the marine environment of the nodules and the potential environmental effects of their commercial extraction.  The topics are:

-- Biodiversity, species ranges and rates of gene flow in the nodule areas.  This research, an extension of a project due to start early next year, is intended to establish a basic understanding of what animals live there, how they are distributed geographically and the extent to which they interbreed.

-- Burial sensitivity of deep-sea animals and their response to the type of disturbance caused when nodules are scraped from the sea floor, as well as the recovery of animal communities in space and time.  The aim is to learn what proportion of animals might be killed, and how long it might take for their populations to return to pre-disturbance levels under different mining scenarios.

-- Impacts on the ocean layers above a mine site caused by unwanted materials from a mining operation.  The bottom water, sediment and nodule wastes likely to be brought to the surface with the nodules will change the ocean environment in ways that this project would seek to clarify.

-- Natural variability in deep-ocean ecosystems over space and time.  These  month-to-month, year-to-year and place-to-place changes are to be investigated as a further means of understanding the environment in which deep-sea mining will operate, especially so that the effects of mining can be distinguished from natural processes.

The biodiversity project would incorporate the techniques of molecular biology or genetic testing – widely known as a tool of criminal investigation – for the purpose of rapidly identifying specimens collected from the deep ocean and correlating them with identified specimens preserved at several institutions around the world.  The Workshop was told that genetic testing could produce in 48 hours, through largely automated techniques, results that conventionally take highly trained specialists three months to achieve.  The plan is to advance the development of these techniques and apply them to deep-sea research.

As the Workshop saw it, all of this research would be organized, managed and conducted by interested scientific institutions and the entities that have contracts with the Authority allowing them to explore specified seabed areas for polymetallic nodules.  The organizers would report results to the Authority, which would disseminate them.  The Authority would also facilitate this work by convening workshops, seeking financial support from other organizations and promoting training opportunities.

During the Workshop, participants from several contractors and scientific bodies voiced a willingness to participate in one or more of the projects by providing funds, personnel and other support, including time aboard their research vessels for the scientists involved.   Four working groups convened during the week, one on each topic, drew up preliminary outlines covering objectives, costs and duration.  (Cost figures given during the Workshop are subject to revision in its final report.)  The groups also identified persons from among the participants who will be responsible for developing plans, contacting potential contributors and seeking support for each project.

Each project has a training component, to give advanced students, especially from developing countries, a chance at hands-on training in laboratories and aboard ship.

In view of the high cost of research aboard specially equipped ships that spend months each year on the high seas, the Workshop urged collaboration among researchers to allocate ship time – the most expensive component of all the research schemes -- in the most cost-effective manner.  It was argued that avoiding duplication of research by several vessels conducting similar studies in adjacent ocean areas could save millions of dollars, at a time when seabed contractors have reduced their exploration activities to await more attractive market conditions for the minerals lying on the seabed.  Despite the likely delay in exploitation, many participants saw no less urgency in conducting environmental studies, some of which could take decades to complete.

The Workshop on Prospects for International Collaboration in Marine Environmental Research to Enhance Understanding of the Deep-Sea Environment was the fifth in a series of technical workshops convened by the Authority on an annual schedule.  It met just before the eighth session of the Authority (5-16 August), whose Legal and Technical Commission will be informed of the results this week.  The Workshop based its proposals on recommendations drawn up by a preparatory meeting of scientists held in Kingston from 11 to 13 March.

Satya N. Nandan, Secretary-General of the Authority, outlining the objectives of the Workshop at its start, observed that previous workshops organized by the Authority had been aimed at understanding what was happening in the seabed environment, since the Authority needed such information to administer the area.   This Workshop, however, differed by its focus on practical co-operation in marine research.  Contractors were not interested in doing science for the sake of science; their emphasis was on extraction of mineral resources.  The Authority, by contrast, took a broader approach.

Speaking of potential benefits to contractors, he said that if it turned out, for example, that mining resulted in species extinctions in one area but populations of those species existed elsewhere, environmental restrictions on mining could be less severe.  Further, using such information in regulating mining could benefit scientists by giving their environmental research a more purposeful focus.  Projects and recommendations developed by the Workshop would be passed on to the Legal and Technical Commission and other organs of the Authority.

Introducing the discussion, the moderator, Craig R. Smith, Professor in the Department of Oceanography of the University of Hawaii, pointed out that substantially more information was needed to predict and manage the environmental impact of deep-sea mining.  Much of the needed information was generic, of a kind that could be collected at one site and applied broadly.  For this, collaboration was preferable to redundant research.  Such collaboration also afforded a means of training young scientists, including those from developing countries.

Congratulating and thanking participants in a closing statement, Secretary-General Nandan recalled the conclusion of last year’s workshop on standardization in marine research that standardization could best be achieved through collaborative efforts, not by decree.  In the advancement of marine research, the Authority’s secretariat could act as a catalyst and focal point, convening meetings to promote desired approaches. 

Details of Proposed Projects

  Biodiversity:  The Workshop has proposed additions to a project already being planned to study biodiversity, species ranges and gene flow in the deep ocean of the Central Pacific Ocean, in the area of polymetallic nodule deposits.  This is known as the Kaplan project, from its main source of funds, the J.M. Kaplan Foundation, a private United States organization.  The research will address the fact that evaluation of the environmental threat exposed by seabed mining is difficult without much better knowledge of the organisms living there and the ecosystems in which they function.

Knowledge of geographical ranges is important to judge the biological impact of mining.  Inevitably, animals will be killed by the mining vehicle and by resettlement of the sediment cloud it raises.  If the affected species has a broad range, there is a good chance that other individuals will recolonize the area; if not, the species might become extinct.   However, recolonization will also depend on the mobility of individuals, which can be measured by gauging the rate of gene flow to assess how widely the individuals travel during their life span.

Identification of species is a major requirement of this research.  Traditionally, this has been a time-consuming task depending on close study of a specimen’s morphology, or anatomical characteristics.  This requires the skills of specialists in taxonomy, who are often familiar with only a limited number of animal groups.  The Workshop has proposed to speed this work by employing the techniques of molecular biology, a rapidly developing science that uses chemical analysis of genes to identify the relationship of one genetic specimen to another.  In this way, once a species has been coded according to its genes, unknown samples – even from animals that have been crushed beyond visual recognition – can be compared with a known type and identified much more rapidly than before.

In proposing to apply this gene sampling technique for species identification in the Kaplan project, the Workshop suggests using it not only to study the new specimens that will be collected but also some of those preserved from past expeditions.  It also proposes work to advance the microarray technique.  A microarray, or “DNA chip” holds a collection of thousands of specimens – actually slices of genetic material arranged on glass slides -- serving as a key to which unknown specimens can be compared.   In this way, for example, collections sampled from two locations can be compared to determine how many species from one place match those from another.   

The Workshop also identified offers by some contractors to provide ship time for research as well as training opportunities for advanced students from various countries.  The Kaplan project organizers offered at least nine traineeships for the molecular biology component.  

The original Kaplan project envisaged a budget of $3.4 million over three and a half years.  During the Workshop a rough price tag of $600,000 was placed on the additional molecular biology component, but a participant calculated that, once DNA chip templates had been produced, scientists anywhere could buy one for $100-400.  Another participant suggested that Germany might be willing to provide up to half of the $400,000 cost of extending the research to megafauna – animals large enough to be seen in standard photographs.

The Workshop was informed that a group of scientists would meet towards the end of this year at Cambridge, England, to identify other bodies interested in the project, select a sampling site in the eastern area of the nodule zone design a sampling programme.  The project will be submitted to the Global Environment Facility, an intergovernmental funding body, for possible support.

Led by the University of Hawaii, the Kaplan project will also have the support of the Natural History Museum of London, the British Antarctic Survey, the Southampton Oceanography Centre (United Kingdom), the French Research Institute for Exploitation of the Sea (IFREMER) and the Japan Marine Science and Technology Centre (JAMSTEC), as well as the Authority.  Representatives of several contractors and other institutions informed the Workshop of their interest in participating, by sending scientists along on the research cruises, offering time on their own vessels and providing training opportunities.

Mining effects:  The second proposed project would investigate the burial sensitivity of seabed organisms – that is, the consequences of dumping a layer of sediment on top of them, as would happen when a mining vehicle digs into the ocean floor.  Specifically, it would seek to elucidate the “single-dose response function” – the reaction to an artificially induced, one-time burial disturbance.  This investigation would require two dives to the bottom by a remotely operated vehicle (ROV):  one dive to deposit sediment in small areas at four different thicknesses, and another dive, one month later, to see what proportion of the animals had been killed.  In later years, surveys would examine the rate at which organisms recolonized the disturbed area.

The cost of such an experiment was estimated at $8.7 million.  Most of this would be for the expense of operating an ROV and for ship time.  Scientists were expected to meet in a workshop within the year to move the project forward.

The proponents of this project in the Workshop disagreed with objections raised by some that there was no urgency to such a study, given the fact that nobody currently planned to mine in the deep seas.  They acknowledged that no contractor present had expressed interest in the experiment.  However, the supporters argued that, if recovery of an ecosystem took 20 years or more, it would be risky to start such experiments only two to five years before mining.  If that happened, the Authority might want to delay mining pending further environmental evaluation.

Water-column impacts:  Assessment of potential effects of mining on the overlying ocean is the topic of the third proposed study.  Specifically, it would test the results when the unwanted materials that might be brought up in a mining operation -- sediment, trace metals from nodule waste, and cold, nutrient-rich bottom water – were discharged into the upper ocean.  The upper layer was chosen because it would be the most economical area for miners to discharge wastes, though some scientists believe that deep or mid-level discharges would be less harmful to the environment.  The project would inject small quantities of experimental substances and sample the effects collecting bottles and bags.  For cost reasons, it would not try to duplicate the mining process in a large-scale experiment.

The investigation would run for four years and be conducted in the Indian and Pacific oceans in alternate years.  The rough cost estimate amounts to $3 million over five years.  Those interested would consult during the coming year, either by electronic mail or in a workshop, to draw up a proposal covering methods, budget and experimental design.

Natural variability:  Studying the possible effects of a mining disturbance is complicated by the fact that natural variations over time and from place to place must be taken into account, and many of these factors are unknown.  Therefore, the fourth project proposed by the Workshop would send ships to measure a wide range of environmental parameters and to repeat the measurements in later years.

This three-year project would cover the $7 million cost of one expedition per year, with a possible extension to five years.  The ships would visit the western, central and eastern sectors of the Clarion-Clipperton Fracture Zone (CCFZ), the nodule bearing area south and southeast of Hawaii. 

This project would be co-ordinated with similar research already being conducted by the China Ocean Mineral Resources Research and Development Association (COMRA), which has begun studies in the seabed exploration area south of Hawaii allocated to it by the Authority.  During the Workshop, COMRA voiced particular interest in this topic and has offered to co-ordinate the plan in its initial stage.

More details on the Workshop, including a summary of presentations by participants, may be found on the Authority’s Website, www.isa.org.jm.

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