DEEP SEA MINING
‘ There are still huge reserves under the sea . By 2040 , I ’ d expect about 30 percent of copper to come from below the water . There ’ s huge potential ’
mining which can become a long-term liability , or for moving people away from a mine site and keeping them away . “ We don ’ t impact on fresh water , we don ’ t impact on people , we don ’ t impact on pollination , we don ’ t have waste dumps , we don ’ t have longterm liabilities . It ticks a lot of boxes .”
As well as paying the appropriate royalties , Nautilus works closely with local government and employs local people where they can . “ You try to start off with as many local employees as you can , but there can be a limited number of skillsets within the local country . They do allow you to bring in experts on the understanding that you ’ ll be training local people to eventually do those tasks – that ’ s the ultimate goal . When I started working in Papua New Guinea in 1995 I remember training up young guys – some of them are now mine managers all around the world . That ’ s been a really good process . We ’ ve actually just taken on two locals to be trained to drive two new machines we ’ ve just taken delivery of .” The government in Papua New Guinea has 15 percent ownership of the project and Nautilus works closely with them . The company has also equipped 15 out of 29 local schools with running water and toilets . “ We work with aid agencies as well as the government and hope that these things we ’ ve helped to put in place will be able to be sustained even once we leave .”
Looking to the future
“ We ’ re the leading company in deep sea mining , we ’ ve got all the technology and most of the patents ,” Mike says .
“ I look at it like oil and gas was in the 50s when the oil and gas industry was virtually non-existent . When it started going offshore in the 60s it slowly grew and now it accounts for about 30 percent of the world ’ s oil and gas production ,” he adds .
“ We know there are these huge resources of copper on the sea floor – the resources on land are of a much lower grade and much harder to get . It doesn ’ t take much imagination to see that a significant chunk of future copper production is going to come from these very large offshore resources .”
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