A Climate Change with Matt Matern
Climate Podcast

You’re listening to Unite and Heal America and CAVC 790. This is Matt Matern, your host. And we have got Dr. Sandor Muslow on the program. Dr. Muslow is a professor of marine geology, he has been the author of 30 scientific articles. He was the former head of the Office of Environmental Management and mineral resources at the International Seabed Authority, which governs sea deep sea mining. So something that probably most people don’t know I certainly didn’t know until very recently was that the International Seabed Authority governs mining throughout the world.

And it’s somewhat the wild wild west out there. And Dr. Muslow was trying to bring, from what I understand some good science to these decisions. And unfortunately, profits seem to have taken center stage in making a lot of these decisions as to what gets mined and what doesn’t get mined. And that is causing a great deal of risk to our our seas. Because mining could be very disruptive to the oceans. And and so that’s why I was excited to have Dr. Muslow on the program to tell us a little bit about this International Seabed Authority and what the potential effects of seabed mining are. So without further ado, Dr. Muslow, thanks for joining us on the program.

Thank you, I think to everybody, all the people in the state who are listening to this program. And yes, as you said, matter the International Seabed Authority it is an institution that he was created in 1996, under the implications of what is was created in 1994 was the United Nations Convention of the Law of the Sea. And that convention has been signed by 168 Member States 167 Plus Euro now, and they say this institution is that it looks like a united nation, but it is not it is an independent institution. So it does not need to report for example, to Mr. Gutierrez the Secretary General in New York.

And as you mentioned, this is a little bit of the Wild West because of that. And the the other thing is, is not random, right that the the headquarters of the International Seabed Authority is in Kingston, Jamaica, right, it’s a place which is difficult to find difficult to reach, and difficult to go every year to the meetings. And you I when I was there, for example, most in outside none of the General Assembly was a maybe four to 50% attendance.

And those in that institution, as Mark mentioned, is a the organization in charge of the governance of the area and the area that they call it is all the oceans and the under under sediments of the ocean that is located beyond national jurisdiction, it is equivalent to the right now more than 77 or, or 54%, it will take 200 meters water that’s between 54 to 60% of the whole oceans of the of the planet. Remember that by area, the ocean covers 70% of our planet.

But we forget that the ocean is water and its volume. And if you consider this, the comparison by volume actually is very little the amount of ocean compared to the volume of our planet actually is one to 10. So it is in alignment that looks huge when we look from the beautiful Pacific beaches of California, of California but actually in volume is very small, therefore very fragile.

So that’s one of the fascinating things is that we’ve got a a un appointed body charged with developing the rules to govern mining, but it really isn’t overseed there is an oversight for this body. And maybe you can explain to to the audience.

Why this is and maybe why there’s a conflict here because as I recall reading in one of the articles that you had been interviewed in, basically that the ISA has two different sets of rules that it’s being governed by article 136 and article 135 of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and then articles 151 150 and 150 to focus on production, exploitation and profits. And it seems, so, the International Seabed Authority is kind of more interested in production exploitation and profits that is on protection of the our oceans that your take?

Exactly what you said, Matt. Today it is a it is a very, very unusual that is in institution which with this internationality, you know, 168 member, it is in charge of two different and opposite directories. One is to protect the common heritage of mankind, because we forget to mention that whatever is found in this area, beyond national jurisdiction, belongs to everybody, and to no one at the same time, this is the best explanation or definition of the common heritage of mankind.

So, the international authority was in charge of protect this common heritage of mankind for the future generations. But at the same time, he has a mandate to explore them. How would you do that? Is it possible to do not not not delay? Nonetheless, all of that’s a contradiction, but also the international say, doesn’t have an even a, a or both? A robot? Does he have any, any boat in any any means to go and look who is doing what in what part of this ocean which is beyond national jurisdiction, right?

I recall, some 17 contracts that are being you know, being at play in the Clarion and Clipper zone, which, which my understanding is two times the size of Mexico, and it’s off the coast of Mexico, in between Mexico and Hawaii. And, and they’re doing maybe 100 samples in this area, which is a enormous, so it’s hard to say that they’re really doing justice to really sampling the the area to make sure that they’re not doing damage, maybe you could talk a little bit more about that particular situation.

In fact, you might the the resolution, for example, for working on deep sea, first of all is expensive, every cruise maybe a couple of million dollars. But if you want to do conscientious and responsible intervention of the area, in this case, deep sea mining, that by the way, every single mine is going to be 3000 square kilometers 3000 square kilometres every single one, you mentioned 17 constructor, can you imagine the destruction of the seafloor.

And so in order to prevent to prevent, right they have a negative impact, we need to do an environmental impact assessment. You know, mental impact assessment has to be a very thorough, robust statistic methodological way to sample the deep sea. So we are able in the future to see if we’re the the risk that we said it will take to do this activity. It was accomplished or not, that’s the been deemed important environmental impact assessment. Man today. The best the best contractor in this case is Germany BGR. He has one sample every 45 square kilometres, does nothing does nothing.

And so is there any environmental impact statement that is required by the ISA currently, there is there is when well, while I was there, there were two environmental impact assessment. One assessment one is statement one is sent by BGR. And the other one was sent by GSR from Belgium to do an experiment. And because of the experiment, the spending is going to be more than 10,000 square meters. It has to be submitted an environmental impact assessment.

The first the first reaction of the Secretary General Mr. Lunch was okay, great. We have the environmental impact assessment, we are done. I said no, we’re not done environmental impact assessment is a process and it doesn’t finish with the set the revision of or the submission of a report it finished when you do the activity and you prove that you did not have that impact that you mentioned there. Right. So I what I have to do, what I have to do it was to consult external people to look at this. So nobody from the ISA are linked to the ESA, we have to say from the scientific point of view, so we have to do an environmental impact assessment. But right now, they just doesn’t nobody to that.

That is pretty shocking that essentially that the International Seabed Authority is allowed out to just let companies submit a statement and then go unchallenged by anybody who, who might say different because obviously the company has has a conflict or has it an interest in a bias towards going forward with the project.

And they’re not going to be as concerned with protecting the sea sea bed as they probably should be. Well, obviously, there are some companies that are going to be even less concerned. And, you know, so it’s a varying degree. But I certainly don’t trust companies to do this unregulated because as we know, there’s a long history of companies putting profits over safety and environmental concerns.

And they take into account also, Matt, the oceans, that without this ocean, we have no life on Earth. It was cruel, when no matter to try to go to my class and try to play with the gravity No, if we destroy our ocean, we have no more life as they were as they as they are the kind of life we know you and our parents knew.

That is exactly the point and, and why I’m so glad to have you on the show to shine a light on this issue, which I think a lot of people don’t know, the dangers that are that we’re facing by this unregulated mining. So you’re you’ve been listening united to heal America and KVC 790 This is Matt Matern and we are going to be right back in just a minute after our break with Dr. Sandor Muslow, who is going to be telling us more about the International Seabed Authority, thank you.

You’re listening to Unite and Heal America at ABC 790 This is Matt matter your host and I am back with Dr. Sandor Muslow. Dr. we I’d like to turn your attention to a topic, which is what has been the experience with deep sea mining and and how it has how the sea has recovered or the seabed has recovered after experiences where it has been mined in the past.

And definitely very good question, Matt. That’s it attract, actually is a crucial question. And there have been a 13 experiments on several places around the world and gipsy in particular one very famous in the it’s called the disco area. And that one is very easy off the coast of Peru and Chile. And it was done by the German. What do they do this the scientists that the science when we have a really a plow machine and they plow the different places of the ocean passing by several places, and taking pictures before and after.

We have been visiting these places up after three decades, nearly four decades. And they are exactly exactly the same as they left when they plow the deep sea. What does it mean? No recovery at all in three decades. So if we’re thinking to do deep sea mining in an area as large as 3000 square kilometer, that part of the seafloor it will never recover. Period. So that when somebody says somebody go ahead,

I was just pretty shocking.

It is shocking. It is shocking. And I I remember to have listened the UnderSecretary General the essential from Mexico, who has actually seen he’s retiring now. The he in the corridor talking to me and like a friendly Spanish thing. Sandwich. The if if the deep sea mining take place, but they’re going to store a little bit, right, this is so huge. That’s a misconception. It doesn’t matter how huge the ocean is. It is the biome, which is the most important in our planet.

Every single species that we know online, at some point is started in the ocean. It didn’t start our land. It started in the ocean. You if you think the first time we have oxygen produce in situ on our planet, it wasn’t the ocean, right down cyanobacteria. And without that oxygen, none of the species not even us could have existed. So we were thinking that the ocean react in various low timescale, even we’re going to destroy but actually you might make a make a megahertz reference in the size of the Clarion Clipperton song close to actually the wife of the United States and Mexico.

If they if they if you put all the content of 17 dimension in the Clarion Clipperton zone, they will allow a diff the seafloor in an area equivalent to Mongolia. Wow. So and they are telling, and they are telling me they are not going to be an environmental impact assessment that is completely irresponsible.

And all of us, all of the people who are listening to us, we are citizens of the world, this ocean belongs to us, because it’s the common heritage of mankind, we need to defend it. And that’s I want to use this little time to thank ABC for the T report opportunity that they’re doing the responsible job to to pass this information or the rest of the world, in this case, North America.

Absolutely, it’s it’s mind blowing that not, you know that more media isn’t covering this, you know, situation, because I mean, you’re talking about plowing the areas and sides of Mongolia out in the ocean, when the experience is that that area is not going to recover. And as you said, that the life on the planet really revolves around our seas being in in good health.

And, you know, clearly, this type of activity is not going to help the health of our seas. So we all need to be standing up to say no to this. Now, let’s go back to kind of the governance of the ISA the international sea seabed association or, and authority sorry, not Association. And I believe that Michael Lodge, is that head of that organization? And who does he answer to?

Nobody, only to the only to the Council on the council is a is a number of countries which rotate a little bit. And there are several by region, like groups, like six groups, and but those those people are ambassadors of the representative of the country who signed the Convention, the UN United Nations Convention of the law they see.

But unfortunately, the people who are working in this permanent mission in Jamaica for the recipient authority, they are there they are they stay there only for three years, maximum four years, they are very young, or they’re very senior, because you can realize, you know, a Chile, in my case, I can speak for my country, the amount of business we have worked with Jamaica, maybe 10 boxes of wine a year.

That will be right, the only reason Chile has an embassy there is because the necessary authority, right? So the people who go there from the diplomatic in the foreign suffer are juniors, who are abroad is the first time they’re going to be diplomat, because nothing will happen. They will not screw up anything, or very senior just before to go to retirement. So what is what is the level of involvement of these people as a citizen, right? Independent independently of the of the country in this issue?

None.

So that’s why…go ahead. Go ahead. Sorry.

So the Secretary General knows this very well, several times, she told me that, you know, all general, were going to tell them to pay more from 47 to 60,000, to the constructor for the administration, say bye, bye. I told you about some country that might not be able to pay and all these are all students. So that’s the way they said that, you know, he told the people represent an interesting period of time. I was shocked when he says when when he was saying those things.

No, maybe maybe not, officially, but I would I wouldn’t not even think that money. So if we’re even I’m a little man, right? And I’m assigned to one of these organizations to represent the country, I will go with it with a huge weight on my shoulder, equivalent to 19 million people who have been represented, which is my country. So I should be very responsible. And I see that it’s not the case in international authority. As I told you before, most of the people who are attend to this a meetings, which are every year, the next one is in July, August, maybe 4050 out of 100 60s because the resident didn’t even care.

Now, is it possible to terminate the contract or have Michael lodge so that he is no longer the head of the ISA?

Yeah, it is possible the council can request it. You know, you can’t So could say, you know, we don’t we don’t I don’t feel the that the the common heritage of mankind is it has warranted to be protected. Because the way that the management has been done, it doesn’t answer. For example, if you look at the budget of Isa, which is 6 million more or less a year, the 80 or 90% is only mining mining code administration and less than 20% is for environmental studies and environmental studies is only workshop meeting here meeting the meeting where they’re meeting every year everywhere, do nothing.

What we should be doing is to do in research with a nanny for improving right they environmental baseline of the area, Clara Caperton son, if we have done in this one in the last 30 years, 20 year, we could have done from the east to the west or the west to the east. Hiring people from Hawaii, he will he will start from the west hiring people from California, Mexico, it will turn from the east and systematically going sampling the client depends on no we don’t do it.

We are we ask the constructor to do the environmental baseline study? Do you see that they will do it?

Of course they will not because it’s money. It cost. So they concentrate all the all the effort only in how much money I want to make.

Now, in terms of the budget, you said of the ISA, I’m not sure if I heard you correctly. But did you say 6 million just 6 million or six, 6 million, 6 million a year more or less? Wow, that’s a tiny budget for an orchestra.

Exactly, exactly. is nothing compared with a 70% of the area of the planet.

Yeah, that’s mind blowing. I mean, I can just tell you that a small law firms budget is beyond that. And that’s, you know, there’s no way that I could manage the entire, you know, ocean on that budget. I mean, there’s no way you could possibly do the proper oversight have the amount of staff that you would need to, to do the work that would be necessary to to properly govern our ocean.

So that to me is just shocking, beyond belief that first off, they need funding to do the to do the work, which probably be in the hundreds of millions of dollars, budget wise to do the type of science that’s necessary, or the alternative is kind of to shut down mining, deep sea mining, until we get a better handle on what the effects are. And don’t screw up what we have, until we really know what we’re doing, which we don’t from what you’re telling me because we’re turning it into a moonscape after we mined so that and it takes probably.

I don’t know how long it takes, but we will, our listeners will find out. back after the break. We’re going to be back in in 60 seconds with Dr. Sandor Muslow, professor of marine geology, also former employee at the International Seabed Authority. He was the head of the Office of Environmental Management and mineral resources of the ISA. We’ll be back in just a minute to talk to Dr. Muslow a bit more about these issues that are so important to everybody.

You’re listening to Unite and Heal America and KBC 790. This is Matern, your host and I’m back with Dr. Sandor Muslow. Doctor, we were just talking about the various contracts that are being used to exploit the sea and my understanding is that there are 30 contractors currently doing mining on the seabed, as we speak. Is that Is that an accurate statement?

Exactly, exactly accurate. They are located everywhere in all the oceans. We have, as you mentioned more than 17 in the current Clipperton zone in the North Pacific. We have some in the southern southern Atlantic close to the coast of Brazil. We have three or four in the North Atlantic in the mid ocean regions, Russia, France and bologna. And then we have a bunch of others in the in the mid ocean regions of the Southern Ocean going around Africa and India.

And we have Germany, India, Korea, Japan and remember, I think China, then we have also a bunch of coins joke’s on the sea mounds close to the Mariana Trench, and they are also Japan, Russia and management. So we have 30 contracts licenses paid. Actually, we need to mention that every contract pays to the international with authority as a million dollar.

So I’m always asking the question, what happened with this so far? More than $30 million? What are they? Are they in a bank account? What are they? What are we doing with the money? We mentioned before? In the I’m sure the listener they remember that the budget was 6 million years for for the industry that has already Yeah, but yeah, received 30 million extra for a for the under the contracts, licenses, Where is money? Why we’re not using that money to study the deep sea? Right example?

So. So those are questions that it will be answer, it will be answered. When when somebody members take it from the Council or the assembly request an international audit, or the International Seabed Authority, not an internal audit an international one, and we do have a way to do it. There is the there is the board of auditors of the United Nations, why we don’t ask them to audit the international authority and clear clarify this. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe I’m just speaking something out of the blue, but I would like to see it on paper.

Do you know if anyone has made the request to have them audited or if we will work?

We try. We try Chile try Chile, I recognized at that point in a senator Bonilla was in in Kingston. And he managed to request this international audit because we knew that something was not right with the money in the way that the contracts, for example, they’re in a private contract international authorities doing that will always go into the same people.

So that’s also which is not correct. The money the money that is entering to the central authority can come from 168 Member States, right. So everybody should have a say in where the money goes and calls out the money suspended. But you see how the three move at that time the President of Chile, he was Piniella, which is the alter right. President from the blue he came to visit Kingston for a weekend. It met directly with the secretary generic and the request disappeared.

So he met with him met with Michael Lodge directly they suckling at all but it is it is a it is done very accurately. And very precisely. Not a working meeting. It was a holiday meeting on Montego Bay. Right. I was not invited. The ambassador was invited the President was invited and lunch was invited. And after that the request disappeared.

What what he was saying? I don’t want to be bad, but I’m sure it wasn’t okay. It basically is okay. I will retire. So I’m going with this. I’m getting something I’m pretty sure.

It certainly looks a little bit fishy. We want we want train. We want transparency in our government. And certainly something as important as mining contracts on the deep sea that are affecting the oceans, which are is the heritage of everybody needs to be scrutinized at the highest level and the greatest amount of scrutiny possible.

Geez, just to build an apartment building in the city of Los Angeles, you’re going to have a lot more scrutiny on the environmental impact of building an apartment building than you would on starting a mine at the ocean floor. And 1000s of square kilometers seems mind blowing but what can you do?

I guess we need to we need to shine a light on this and tell our representatives tell our various governments that we want an audit, we want potentially to have Michael lodge dislodged from his position, because isn’t he getting some monetary benefit from entering into these mining contracts with these various mining companies.

So, definitely use the word word to what you just mentioned is exactly what I have in mind and I think most of the people have been talking when I I disclosed this information is wow. But if we go further you know it. It is amazing that the the the senior scientific adviser of the metal company, where General Baron is a CEO is a person who is married or is a couple with a lady and that lady is a cousin or the former wife of Lodge. So everything is Same family.

That’s incredible.

So when when, when you start looking at those things, you say, what does he mean? These are Lessing straight maybe is not what I’m meaning. But you really look at that that is incredible. So from what I understand it’s the lawyers that are making the decisions as to where thing, you know, whether mining permits are granted, rather than scientists. Is that Is that true?

Yeah. Exactly. And actually lawyers are you are very, you are very gracious. My because the person who is right in the Monaco is one lawyer one, Mr. Christopher Brown, nobody there to measurement degree should check him out. Who is this Mr. Christopher Brown? I check him out. He’s an expert in I think it’s called royalties in music in the music industry. And he still he is the expert in the mining law and mining code. It is unbelievable. It is unbelievable.

Yeah, it seems as though it’s almost laughable, but at the same time tragic that somebody who is so unqualified could be making the decisions that are affecting our entire planet and imperiling our entire planet based upon probably improper motivations, which is these mining companies are making tons of money mining various metals at the deep sea.

Now, one of the things that you had told me offline was kind of the level of concentration of these mineral minerals in the various rocks that are on the deep sea are much higher concentration of say copper or magnanni mag magnesium at manganese at at the ocean floor than what you would you would find at, you know, on on land mines.

You Yeah, exactly, is the fact that, so then they, they, actually they, for me, the I’m trying to look, I’m trying to be very, very patient with the arguments that the constructors are dealing or promoting or stating that they are what is behind for the attitude to go and request a mining license, in this case, exploitation but with the with the view of exploit exploration with a view to exploitation.

And the the speech that we hear is very loud and clear. And we a lot of money behind from the company from the deep green or to the metal company, but also GSR, which is the company from Belgium. And they both speak to have the same that they’re going to collect all these rare earth minerals, all this copper that we need, and all these manganese that we also want the iron.

Oh, they are the nickel and cobalt right? Because they are thinking that they will provide a cheaper, a cheaper metal needed elements needle, but to the transition between combustion, mobility to E mobility, electronic mobility. And the bottom line is lithium.

Actually, it is it is a conundrum there is a huge conundrum there because the the lithium batteries, it is the smallest element three atomic number. So we don’t we don’t have a smaller than this molecule is hydrogen and helium in the other side. And this is origin we need to create so much huge weight of lithium only battery to move to three people in the car.

So from the from the physical point of view, it’s not going to work but worse. We need to charge them with electricity. Where are we going to get electricity or oil? I think we were I worry for co2 was supposed to solve the problem for co2. The solution there is a solution. Of course there is a solution but it’s not what the constructor they’re going to do deep sea mining is the solution is to use hydrogen. That’s that’s the that’s the only solution we have today.

Hydrogen, not batteries. But the Deconstructor are pushing to do the to find an excuse to go on deep sea mining and the excuse is inability but actually is money. You mentioned in math. You know if you if you if you earn money, taking a mineral from land at point 4% If you’re going to do the same effort on the ocean and you’re getting 4% I will invest in the deep Situ.

Right, it’s a 10% or a factor of 10 greater level of concentration Saturday that’s gonna have 10 times as much potential profit for the mining company.

Well, the price right? So that’s why these mining companies are into this is that they, they are in it for the money. Well, that doesn’t shock any of us. But hydrogen being the fuel the future is something I believe in and I I think that is very important now.

Looking forward to talking to you about that after we get back from our break your lesson to Unite and Heal America and CAVC 790 This is Matt Matern, your host and I’ll be right back in one minute with Dr. Sandor Muslow, and talking about hydrogen and how we can save the planet.

You’re listening to Unite and Heal America and CAVC 790. This is Matt Matern, your host, and I’m speaking with Dr. Sandor Muslow. And Dr. what, what do we do now? What’s, what paths can we take to correct do some course correction? And and limit the amount of deep sea mining going forward?

Yeah, there’s a very good question. And we have been talking about it a little bit, you know, give a sense of what the real issue is to all our our people who are listening to us on this program. And you know, as you mentioned before, Matt, and we were discussing of the of the phone of the of the recording.

Now who Republic on the order requested a two year a provision for data mining and there is a date. And that date, it is on the 23rd of June 2023 is next year, and where they will be allowed to mine the deep sea and with regulation with no regulations. And so if we look at from that point of view, we have very little things to do.

But one thing that we can do right is to request a moratorium on deep sea mining based on the lack of warranty, first of the governance of the International Data authority as we have been discussing for this hour right now, that it is not governing at all the common heritage of mankind. And for the lack of scientific robustness of the information on the deep sea and environmental studies, nothing had been done.

The International Seabed Authority should change and shift gears towards explore, to protect, not explore, to exploit, explore to protect, because it’s the common areas of mind how can we do this go talk to connect every constituencies every time to assign the international authority should request a an audit what I’ve been doing what I’ve been doing with the money that come from my taxes from individual point 168 countries, what I’ve been doing with these taxes, my tax money that we’ve been saddled with, with authority that now we’re going to get very diverse to destroy the most important biome of this planet, which is the see Mark mentioned before that we’ll see provide a lot of things to us.

One of the things that provide is to third of the oxygen that we respire important, so if we if we want to Unite and Heal America, I think we should also Unite and Heal our planet. We don’t need to go and look for Mars or the Aiyo in in Jupiter and Saturn or any other planet, let’s protect ours or make it better for the future generation. I think that’s the best mixed message that we can give.

One thing that I have been feeling is that the oceans you know, day after day I review the journals and the literature which is my job as being a scientist is that I am getting to the sense that our ocean are losing their memory. And that’s so crucial. What do I mean for that?

They’re losing the memory that the temperature the sea, it should not go higher now doesn’t know anymore. What is the normal they are losing the the fact that the deep sea today it is releasing carbonate that it was a store by the the cycle of the of the carbon because the pH is changing. The ocean doesn’t know what the pH it is now it is changing.

We are changing every single ecological function on the Deep Sea and the ocean isn’t getting SENAI and not remembering that in the interglacial period that we are right now. The variations are small, we are making it bigger every single variable in the deep sea What the impact of that will be us? We’re going to be suffering, food, everything. I mean, in terms of what we can do here in the US, and my understanding is John Kerry is, you know, one of the lead people on, you know, dealing with environmental issues worldwide for the US. Have you spoken to him?

Or do you know of what he’s doing on this front at bringing some order to this isa, which is kind of like a rogue elephant at this point in time? Or is there somebody else in the US that you think we as citizens should be directing our attention to, to say, hey, let’s, let’s rein in this isa and stop put a moratorium on deep sea mining.

I think I think then your suggestion to contact, John Kerry’s will be great. It is interesting, because I met him while I was a grad student at Warsaw, I started in Busan in Cape Cod. I did my PhD. And I went to one of his hearing when he was a senator. And they he was dealing with the Graduate Studies and foreigners. I think, actually, he he doesn’t know about this, I’m pretty sure.

So if you guys through the CAVC are able to contact I invite him, invite him to this program. Sure if you could come and to tell him you and to request from him a commitment from the internet from the from the United States, towards the international community to promote a moratorium on the mind until we know what are we going to do with this.

Don’t let the only environment I repeat the only environment which is resilient enough to keep all us alive. If we are going to take away that resilient and we’re doing it now. That’s what I say it is using the memory. We don’t know where we’re going to happen. But I’m sure my my grandson’s, they will be swimming in an ocean, that is not the same one that I son when I was that age.

Now in terms of other countries that are contributing to the problem here, my understanding is that the United Kingdom and the countries in the in the Commonwealth are kind of on the cutting edge in the wrong way. As far as deep sea mining and that David Cameron had back in 2012. It said, Hey, this is going to be a big industry for the UK. And let’s go all in for deep sea mining. What’s your understanding of what’s happening on the ground?

It’s exactly my ask you all the all the people who are listening, and they don’t want to believe or what we’re saying, let one go on it. And let me check the Guardian 2012 David Cameron, and you will and you will see the speech is still there. And of course, the Commonwealth’s right now are seven, seven licenses for exploration towards exploitation in the terminal Jupiter and sun, which is entitled to an area of 490,000 square kilometres for mining.

This should not be allowed. I’m wondering Mark, if the regular Citizen of the Year of the United Kingdom knows this? Pretty sure they don’t? I’m pretty sure they don’t. Because if they do if they do, we should be more and more. You mentioned at the beginning, why more? No more journalists? Why no more program? Why no more television programs about this? Because nobody knows it. Nobody knows about this. I gave lectures every time in my university and around my country.

And the first question asked, Does anybody know where the United Nation convention or the Law of the Sea is? Nobody knows it. Right? So the job that you’re doing here, guys, it has no value you have no, I don’t see. So you can see the scale of whoever is listening to this is a person who is going to be more informed than he was an hour ago.

Well, that’s that’s the intent of the program. It is shocking to think that the UK is has got mining operations that are going on on 490,000 square kilometers on our seabed. And that’s, that’s probably a very good chunk of what would be the UK is territory if it’s not bigger than the entire US. That’s, that’s mind blowing.

So exactly. I think if you managed to convince John Kerry, I will. If you do a meeting, invite me I will talk to him directly and we will get all the information there the country that we need to get involved with Japan, and Germany because Japan and Germany are the biggest contributor and annually to the budget of international health authority, I’m pretty sure the Japanese don’t know what they’re doing. And also they don’t know the regular cities of Germany, they know that Germany is paying more than 400 and half a million dollar every every year to the international authority.

Well, in and I know that particularly in Germany, they have quite an active environmental party there, the Green Party is is very large and part of the governing coalition there. So that I would imagine there. If they knew about this, they might take some action.

So it’s certainly incumbent upon all of us who do now know this to, to try to disseminate this information as widely as we can and, and get out the word that a moratorium on deep sea mining is imperative. And we need to do it as soon as possible because destroying the ocean is, is self destructive. I mean, it’s like destroying ourselves.

It’s committing essential ecological suicide, which is insane. So you know, Dr. It’s been a pleasure having you on our program. And I’ll give you the final word to, to talk to our listeners, and then we’ll close out the program.

And the only thing that I would like to say to all the listeners is that [unintelligible], thank you very much.

Well, I thank you again, doctor, for being on the program. It’s been a pleasure, and we’d love to have you back in the future and certainly work together with you on creating a moratorium on deep sea mining, and to help save our oceans and to save our planet. So, again, you’re listening to Unite and Heal America and KBC 790.

This is Matt Matern, your host and we’ll look forward to having you back listening in next week. Thank you.

As you may know, your host Matt Matern of Unite and Heal America is also the founder of Matern Law Group, their team of experienced employment consumer and environmental attorneys are dedicated to leveling the playing field by giving everyone access to the highest quality legal representation contact 844-MLG for you, that’s 844-MLG for you or 844-654-4968.