Ocean Floor Mining

Peace and war are both acts that happen in life. Ocean floor mining is a topic that pretty much falls under both categories. Sorry for not introducing myself, I am Alex, which you probably know by now :D I am not the biggest fan of mining, I very much prefer Math over it, but during the last month my class was meant to write a little summary about this topic. So the first thing you should know, is that there are two main ways of mining minerals,crystals and rocks. There is surface mining and subsurface mining.
Surface mining: The process of mining that happens on the surface of the Earth
Subsurface mining: The process of mining mostly happening under the Earth or deeper than you can dig with your hand.
Ocean mining pretty much belongs to subsurface mining because you have to get to the bottom to get the minerals. So first of all, if I was to summarize the controversy of ocean mineral rights, which means the issues that have been happening and arguments, the first issue would be choosing which land is the one possessing the ocean floors with the minerals. What can countries do to prevent conflicts over mining the ocean floor? Well, they might want to arrange a compromise. Also wealthy nations could contribute part of their profits to help developing countries. What a lot of citizens think, is that which ever country or city is the closest to the ocean, or is surrounded by any water body, should obtain part of the profits from the minerals. But here is an other question, what if there is a wealthy city, that could afford all the machines and everything needed to obtain ocean floor mining, but it is no where close to a water body? That's just bad luck right?

     Wealthiness is very important and affects everything if we are talking about ocean floor mining. The country had to be most likely somewhere in the point of being wealthy because of all the equipment and tools needed to be able to start. All the machines needed to dig up Earth, and all the safety equipment will cost a fortune. Developing countries have to take the fact in consideration that if they do pay what they can, and start mining, will it be worth it? Governments play a huge role nowadays with these issues. They are the people who help us make decisions and give us reasons why to or why not to go for what we are aiming. Developing countries might want to make a deal with the wealthy countries but maybe not be the ones to exactly extract the minerals from the Oceans because that takes much more money than just making a deal. If a developing city or state is surrounded by a body of water, they most probably might share the profits with other cities by allowing them to work in the water, but they have to share with you what they get. So after all, a lot of the achievements of a country, depend on if it is wealthy and can afford everything, or if it is a developing country. Sometimes the country might be a poor country in general, but its minerals and mines make it rich.

     Every Ocean has its own issues and places it "belongs" to. Let's start with the Atlantic Ocean. The Atlantic Ocean is the second biggest Ocean in the world and covers about 20%of the Earths atmosphere. Since the ocean is divided into North and South from the equator, it borders with Eurasia, Africa and America. It would be most common for these places to have some issues like who does the ocean belong to? Well, a good way of solving this would be to split the ocean into 3 parts and every plate gets a bit. These countries would have a lot of resources and could be able to produce money by trading. But as the government says, the ocean is for everyone or for no one. I think this should be taken in consideration because it's true, everyone in the world is trying to teach us how to make peace and how sharing is caring, if it is caring, why aren't the Oceans shared with developing countries?  Some minerals that are found in the Atlantic are salt,  bromine and magnesium. Oceans and seas are the largest solar collectors. The Atlantic gives us a lot of resources, just as the other Oceans.
   The Pacific Ocean is the largest ocean on Earth. Pretty much everything I said for the previous ocean, also goes with this one. The Pacific borders with California, Hawaii, Washington, so mostly America and also part of Australia. These are a lot of places, but also places that are not close to the shore, I think should be able to have some of the Ocean. Since there is more Ocean than land, every piece of land should have some part of Oceans. The Pacific, mostly provides us with metals. Sand and gravel also comes from all oceans. With all these minerals and elements, we can produce more useful tools and create beaches for tourism.
 The last ocean I will talk about now, is the Arctic Ocean. This ocean is the smallest ocean on Earth and is located in the Arctic north polar region. It is pretty much surrounded by Eurasia and North America and lastly seas. Nowadays, a lot of the ice on the Arctic Ocean is melting which gives us, people, a great opportunity to get more minerals. Some of these may include salt,natural gases, hydrocarbons, and more. This specific ocean is located in the Arctic Ocean, and all the countries or parts of countries that are in it, have the biggest chance of having the benefits from the melting. Some places like South America, which has nothing to do with the Arctic Ocean, also want some of the material, so now there is an issue. They still haven't found an answer to this. Even thought this is the smallest ocean, it is the one that probably gives us the most because of the weather change.The answer to this problem, will also depend on how developed the place is, does it have enough money to afford everything for extracting the minerals out of water or what ever substance they are found in? So after all, all ocean give us something, and everything they give us, we should treasure of ages.
    In my opinion, what the world is doing, and its decisions, for example the one that the wealthy countries have a better chance for everything, might be a bit unfair but it is kind of working out. Also, it is interesting researching about everything that is going on in the world, and which minerals are found where because it fills you with more information and helps you be able to answer questions if anyone asks you. Learning about this topic was pretty interesting, even thought it did take a bit more time than others do. If you are interested more in finding out about Earths processes and what is going on, you can research by yourself, or you can comment under :D