A Mineral Store/wwe
119
At the moment, deep-sea mining sounds alarmingly futuristic,
but the technology involved is already within the intellectual grasp
of the engineer. Writing in Mining Engineering (August 1964) G. S.
Lockwood of the Global Marine Exploration Company summed
up the situation as follows: ‘When looking at the various engineering
problems associated with a mining scheme using a bottom tractor
or a buoyant vehicle coupled with a pipeline to a surface vessel,
there do not appear
to be any formidable obstacles which have not
been solved previously in different situations. To be sure, a deep—
ocean mining system has never been put together before, and its
development will certainly involve the usual ‘bugs’ and redesigning
associated with pioneering any complex system. However, it appears
that the engineering factors involved are within the present state of
knowledge.’
The dissoZved minerals
Only three chemicals are extracted from sea—water on a commercial
scale: salt, bromine and magnesium. The history of taking salt from
sea—water may go back as far as the Minoan culture some 5,000 years
ago. Many early civilizations—for example in India, the Middle
East and South America—probably owed their existence and
survival to an access to supplies of salt either in deposits of rock salt
or in the sea. Today as much as a third of the world’s production of
salt still comes from the sea, the heat of the sun being used to
evaporate the water just as was done thousands of years ago. The
production of salt in this way also led to the extraction of magnesium
from the sea in the 19305, and today most of this metal comes from
sea-water or brines. Magnesium is needed in a variety of industries
including pharmaceutical, fertilizer and synthetic fabric manu—
facture, and it is also used in the production of most light alloys for
the aerospace and other industries. Bromine too is becoming
increasingly important in the photographie and pharmaceutical
industries. But its greatest value for most of us is its use with the
anti—knock compound, tetraethyl lead in petrol; without a bromide
additive, which forms a volatile compound with lead, the motor car
engine would become fouled up with inorganic deposits from the
leaded fuel.
_
The inuence of salt in social and marine aairs has been felt
since early times. It was a source of trade which sent merchant
vessels across the occans; it was a prize which brought Norse and
119
At the moment, deep-sea mining sounds alarmingly futuristic,
but the technology involved is already within the intellectual grasp
of the engineer. Writing in Mining Engineering (August 1964) G. S.
Lockwood of the Global Marine Exploration Company summed
up the situation as follows: ‘When looking at the various engineering
problems associated with a mining scheme using a bottom tractor
or a buoyant vehicle coupled with a pipeline to a surface vessel,
there do not appear
to be any formidable obstacles which have not
been solved previously in different situations. To be sure, a deep—
ocean mining system has never been put together before, and its
development will certainly involve the usual ‘bugs’ and redesigning
associated with pioneering any complex system. However, it appears
that the engineering factors involved are within the present state of
knowledge.’
The dissoZved minerals
Only three chemicals are extracted from sea—water on a commercial
scale: salt, bromine and magnesium. The history of taking salt from
sea—water may go back as far as the Minoan culture some 5,000 years
ago. Many early civilizations—for example in India, the Middle
East and South America—probably owed their existence and
survival to an access to supplies of salt either in deposits of rock salt
or in the sea. Today as much as a third of the world’s production of
salt still comes from the sea, the heat of the sun being used to
evaporate the water just as was done thousands of years ago. The
production of salt in this way also led to the extraction of magnesium
from the sea in the 19305, and today most of this metal comes from
sea-water or brines. Magnesium is needed in a variety of industries
including pharmaceutical, fertilizer and synthetic fabric manu—
facture, and it is also used in the production of most light alloys for
the aerospace and other industries. Bromine too is becoming
increasingly important in the photographie and pharmaceutical
industries. But its greatest value for most of us is its use with the
anti—knock compound, tetraethyl lead in petrol; without a bromide
additive, which forms a volatile compound with lead, the motor car
engine would become fouled up with inorganic deposits from the
leaded fuel.
_
The inuence of salt in social and marine aairs has been felt
since early times. It was a source of trade which sent merchant
vessels across the occans; it was a prize which brought Norse and