Norway greenlit seabed mining exploration. Here’s how one startup plans to cash in.
…and how marine scientists plan to stop it.
It’s been a big year for Loke Marine Minerals.
The Norway-based seabed mining startup didn’t hold a single exploration license as of early 2023. Then Loke made a splash last March by purchasing UK Seabed Resources (UKSR), a subsidiary of US-based Lockheed Martin. Loke nabbed not one, but two exploration licenses that UKSR held from the International Seabed Authority. That gives the firm exclusive rights to search for polymetallic nodules in a Louisiana-sized swath of the eastern Pacific.
Now, Loke’s found action closer to home too.
‘The decision we’ve been waiting for’
Earlier this month, Norway’s parliament approved mining exploration in its Arctic Ocean waters. The move was controversial among marine scientists but welcomed by industry.
“This is the decision we’ve been waiting for,” Loke CEO Walter Sognnes said in a Spotlight story at the time. “The green transition is screaming for more minerals.”
Sognnes thinks Norway’s seabed could meet that demand with less environmental and social upheaval than, say, nickel mining in Indonesia.
So Loke plans to pair its nodule exploration in the Pacific with domestic work off the coast of Norway—but in some ways, the two endeavors are apples and oranges.
The seabed that Norway opened for exploration doesn’t have many nodules, which typically sit unattached atop the sediment. Instead, the region contains cobalt-rich crusts and sulfide deposits. Those are both very attached to their underlying geologic formations (cobalt-rich crusts form on seamounts, and sulfide deposits form around hydrothermal vents). That means they need to be pulverized into small chunks that can be vacuumed up to the surface.
Other companies have built terrifying machines for this kind of seabed shredding. Sognnes said Loke has its own technology, though extraction in Norway is still a few years away. “We will not be ready with a production application before 2030.”
For now, Loke needs to determine whether mining Norway’s cobalt-rich crusts is worth their effort in the first place. The company will measure crust thickness by taking acoustic measurements and drilling small-diameter boreholes. Some of these deep-water techniques are borrowed from the oil and gas industry, of which Sognnes is a 20-year veteran.
Sognnes said Loke’s exploration will also help catalog marine life on the seamounts, which occur in the Norwegian Sea between Norway and Greenland. The seamounts appear to harbor “much less biomass” than comparable formations elsewhere in the global ocean, according to Sognnes.
That view is not universal.
‘Absolutely covered in fauna’
Seamounts are, of course, mountains beneath the sea. And just like mountains on land, seamounts’ varied terrain yields a diversity of habitats for animals.
Heidi Meyer is an ecologist at the Institute of Marine Research in Bergen, Norway, and she spent her PhD studying some of the seamounts recently opened to mining exploration. The area is “absolutely covered in fauna,” said Meyer. “It was very biodiverse, especially compared to the nearby region.”
Meyer noted the abundance of sea sponges. Like coral reefs, sponges form habitat and nursery grounds for fish.
Despite her research, Meyer said most of the seamounts in the region remain largely unknown to science and that it’s premature to allow industry access to them. Politicians in the neighboring EU have echoed Meyer’s concerns.
Norway doesn’t yet allow commercial extraction in its waters. But regulations seem to be drifting that way—both in Norway and on the High Seas as the International Seabed Authority draws up its mining code.
In the meantime, mining firms seem content to stay heads-down and largely out of the media spotlight (with one loud exception). But they’re honing their technology and financing, diligently working toward a payday.
Scientists like Meyer hope that day doesn’t come soon.
“We need to have more thorough research done,” said Meyer. “Hopefully the government will listen to scientific advice before it’s too late.”