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Deep-sea mining poses an unjustifiable environmental risk

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Deep-sea mining could provide a substantial supply of metals that we urgently need to decarbonize our society, yet its environmental impact remains intractable. Considering on-land resources remain abundant and can be extracted using well-established risk management, deep-sea mining cannot currently be justified.

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Fig. 1: Schematic diagram of the three main ore deposit types currently proposed for DSM and the likely environmental impacts of such activity.

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Correspondence to Rich Crane.

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Crane, R., Laing, C., Littler, K. et al. Deep-sea mining poses an unjustifiable environmental risk. Nat Sustain (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-024-01326-6

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