Deep trouble: for most electric vehicle makers, the seabed remains off limits

There’s a vast source of battery components at the bottom of the ocean but with the jury out on the damage extraction could cause, auto companies are steering well clear, says Evan Halper

Launching the robot used in deep-sea mining by the Metals Company (Metals Company)

As car manufacturers scour the planet for the metals it will take to build tens of millions of electric cars, they are deliberately taking a detour around one of the only places on Earth where so much of what they need is lying around and available to be plucked.

The deep seabed is teeming with potato-sized rocks packed with the nickel, cobalt, copper and manganese EV manufacturers covet. But efforts by mining companies to harvest the nodules with undersea robots are hitting rough waters. EV manufacturers who need the minerals for their batteries are distancing themselves from the practice as diplomats and scientists sound an alarm over the ecological damage that could be caused by rushing to scrape the sea floor.

The misgivings of the auto companies are hardly assuaged by the messy, contentious deliberations over it all at the headquarters of the United Nations-chartered International Seabed Authority (ISA) here in Jamaica. The authority, tasked with protecting and guiding development in international waters, has been in turmoil since the small Pacific Island nation of Nauru invoked a clause tucked in the Law of the Sea that could allow mining within months, likely before the full environmental impact is known or regulations are put in place.