Comment on “It’s the New Underwater Gold Rush”: Metallic Potatoes on the Ocean Floor Are Suddenly Worth Billions—and The Race to Claim Them Has Begun by William Robson

In the profound, sunless quiet of the Pacific Ocean floor, a new kind of gold rush is beginning. But the treasure isn’t gleaming in a vein of quartz; it’s scattered like forgotten potatoes across the abyssal plains. The International Seabed Authority (ISA), the U.N.-body governing mineral resources in international waters, has already issued over 19 exploration contracts for the CCZ. The nodules form the very foundation of this ecosystem, providing a rare hard surface in the soft ooze for deep-sea corals, sponges, and anemones to attach themselves. The Pacific island nation of Nauru, sponsoring a mining venture, triggered a controversial legal clause in 2021 that forces the ISA’s hand.