Recent News
Vast deposits of rare earth minerals, crucial in making high-tech electronics products, have been found on the floor of the Pacific Ocean and can be readily extracted, Japanese scientists said on Monday.
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Japanese researchers say they have discovered vast deposits of rare earth minerals, used in many hi-tech appliances, in the seabed. The geologists estimate that there are about a 100bn tons of the rare elements in the mud of the Pacific Ocean floor.
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The world's insatiable demand for the rare-earth elements needed to make almost all technological gadgets could one day be partially met by sea-floor mining, hints an assessment of the Pacific Ocean's resources. But accessing the treasure trove of key elements on the ocean floor will be very expensive and potentially harmful to sea-floor ecology.
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A report from a panel of international ocean management experts on "the rationale for acceding, focusing specifically on the relevance of UNCLOS to national security and economic well-being."
[ More ]The authors argue that U.S. failure to ratify the Law of the Sea has put "the world’s leading maritime power ... at a military and economic disadvantage."
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Call it the old “seat at the table” argument. The U.S. Senate should ratify the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), the argument goes, in order to give America “a seat at the table” in resolving maritime disputes. It’s an argument that has been made so many times that even its proponents no longer understand it.
[ More ]The author argues that the Obama administration should learn from its success in ratifying New Start, "[b]y having the military lobby moderate Republican Senators, like he did with New START, Obama may be able to ratify a treaty that his predecessor, President George W. Bush, failed to do."
[ More ]The authors argue that "China is playing fast and loose in claiming rights to territory on and beneath the South China Sea. The United States could help the situation by joining the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea."
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Since 2007, in large part due to aggressive Russian posturing, the Arctic region has become a bone of contention among members of the Arctic Council as well as a subject of international concern. While the signing of the Russo-Norwegian treaty on September 15 put an end to disputes over seabed and maritime borders between two claimants of the region, the Arctic issue has seen the emergence of a critical Asian dimension as it becomes the source of cooperation as well as simmering tension between Russia and China.
[ More ]For decades, entrepreneurs have tried to strike it rich by gathering up the manganese nodules that carpet the global seabed but until now they have not been able to prove the economic viability of these ventures. The nodules turn out to contain so-called rare-earth minerals — elements that have wide commercial and military application but have hit a production roadblock.
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