Treasure on the ocean floor

　　TODAY, deep-ocean mining is done only by the oil and gas industry. Yet the dream of mining the mineral wealth of the deep has never gone away. Now two firms hope to succeed where others have failed.

　　Nautilus Minerals, based in Vancouver, is the more advanced of the pair. It has an exploratory licence from Papua New Guinea and has already begun drilling operations 1,600 metres below sea level off the east coast of the country. Another company, Neptune Minerals, based in London and Sydney, has completed test drilling in the deep waters near New Zealand.

　　Nautilus’s deep-water exploration relies on a modified deep-sea remotely operated vehicle (ROV) of the kind normally used in the oil and telecoms industries. It has a manipulator hand containing drilling and cutting tools that allow the robot to retrieve samples of rock from the ocean bed. So far the drilling has only been exploratory, but the prospects look good.

　　The presence of these rich deposits has been known about for years, says Steven Scott, a geologist at the University of Toronto. He has been researching underwater geology since the 1980s, and in the 1990s he co-discovered the deposit that Nautilus is exploring. So why has it taken so long to move towards the commercial exploitation of deep sea massive sulphide deposits? Mr Heydon says it is because the ROV technology has only recently become capable enough. He eventually hopes to use rock-cutting ROVs that will drive across the sea floor, grinding ore as they go and sending it to the surface via a tube at a rate of 400 tonnes per hour. It might also be possible to lift large deposits using compressed air.

　　All of this can be done, Mr Heydon believes, for about half as much as opening a new land�瞓ased mine. Nautilus has spent about $12m in the past year on exploration, and Dr Scott says one test drilling found deposits 19 metres deep. Unlike manganese nodules, which are like golf balls scattered across the seabed, these deep-ocean deposits occur in small areas around extinct hydrothermal vents. Such concentrated deposits ought to make underwater mining highly efficient.

　　Even if the economics stack up, however, Nautilus and Neptune must overcome concerns over environmental damage. Dr Scott argues that underwater mining will be far less disruptive to the environment than terrestrial mining: there will be no piles of waste rock, since the deposits are directly on the sea floor. And whereas the oil industry lays pipelines underwater, mining would not leave any permanent structures behind. But governments will need to be convinced of the merit of these arguments before mining can begin.

　　考研詞匯：

　　terrestrial[tiˈrestriəl]

　　a.陸地的;n.陸地生物

　　remotely[ri'məutli]

　　ad.遙遠(yuǎn)地, 偏僻地

　　retrieve[riˈtri:v]

　　v.重新得到;n.找回

　　deposit[diˈpɔzit]

　　v.①存放;②儲蓄;③使沉淀;④付(保證金);n.①存款，保證金;②沉積物

　　[真題例句]More and more of these credit cards can be read automatically, making it possible to withdraw or deposit (v.②) money in scattered locations, whether or not the local branch bank is open.[1994年閱讀2]

　　[例句精譯] 越來越多的信用卡可以自動讀取，于是持卡人就可以在不同地方存取，而不管本地支行是否營業(yè)。

　　grinding

　　a.磨的, 磨擦的, 碾的

　　scatter[ˈskætə]

　　v.①散開，驅(qū)散;②散布，散播

　　[真題例句]More and more of these credit cards can be read automatically, making it possible to withdraw or deposit money in scattered (①) locations, whether or not the local branch bank is open.[1994年閱讀2]

　　[例句精譯] 越來越多的信用卡可以自動讀取，于是持卡人就可以在不同地方存取，而不管本地支行是否營業(yè)。

　　背景常識介紹：

　　深海采礦技術(shù)是深海采礦業(yè)中的支柱性技術(shù)，它對海洋的其他產(chǎn)業(yè)技術(shù)，如近海礦產(chǎn)業(yè)、深海油氣業(yè)、海洋能源業(yè)、船舶制造業(yè)等都會有重大的影響。專家們預(yù)測，未來的深海采礦業(yè)很可能是一組采礦、海洋能源利用和深海農(nóng)牧漁業(yè)等綜合發(fā)展的高新技術(shù)產(chǎn)業(yè)群。深海采礦技術(shù)是未來海洋產(chǎn)業(yè)中的先導(dǎo)性行業(yè)技術(shù)，它對整個海洋高新技術(shù)的潛在影響是深遠(yuǎn)的。

　　參考譯文：

　　海底寶藏

　　今天，深海采礦只是在石油和天然氣工業(yè)領(lǐng)域得以實現(xiàn)。然而開發(fā)深海金屬礦藏的念頭始終縈繞在人們腦海中。現(xiàn)在兩家公司正希望去實現(xiàn)別人未能完成的愿望。

　　位于溫哥華的鸚鵡螺礦業(yè)公司是這兩家公司里比較超前的一家。它擁有巴布亞新幾內(nèi)亞的開發(fā)執(zhí)照并且已經(jīng)開始在該國東海岸海面下1600米處進(jìn)行鉆探。另一家公司是海王星礦業(yè)公司，分別設(shè)在倫敦和悉尼。該公司已經(jīng)在新西蘭附近完成了深水鉆探。

　　鸚鵡螺公司的深水開發(fā)依賴于一種由普通用在石油和電信工業(yè)上的深水遠(yuǎn)程操作工具改進(jìn)而來的機(jī)器。這種機(jī)器有一個操作臂，其中包括了鉆頭和開掘工具，使得機(jī)器人可以從深海海底回收巖石樣品。到目前為止這種鉆探僅僅是探索性的，但是其前景很看好。

　　知道這些富礦的存在已經(jīng)有多年了，多倫多大學(xué)地質(zhì)學(xué)家史蒂芬·斯科特說。史蒂芬·斯科特自20世紀(jì)80年代就開始研究水下地質(zhì)學(xué)。在20世紀(jì)90年代，他與別人共同發(fā)現(xiàn)了鸚鵡螺公司正在開發(fā)的這個礦藏。那么為什么深海金屬硫化物礦的商業(yè)化開發(fā)要等這么長時間?海登說，這是因為ROV技術(shù)只是在比較近才得以真正用于實戰(zhàn)。他比較終希望能用可以橫穿海底的巖石開掘機(jī)ROV將礦石碾碎，然后通過一條管道以每小時400噸的速度將其運(yùn)至海面。利用壓縮空氣來向海面運(yùn)送大塊礦石或許也是可行的。

　　海登相信，只要花費(fèi)相當(dāng)于一個陸地礦井一半的費(fèi)用，所有這些就都可以實現(xiàn)。斯科特博士說，鸚鵡螺公司過去的一年中在勘測上花費(fèi)了1200萬美元，有一次鉆探發(fā)現(xiàn)了19米深的礦物層。與錳結(jié)核像高爾夫球洞一樣分散在海底不同的是，這些深海礦物層則在熄滅了的海底煙囪附近小范圍內(nèi)存在。這樣的集中式分布可以使水下開采效率大大提高。

　　即使經(jīng)濟(jì)上的問題堆積如山，鸚鵡螺公司與海王星公司仍必須克服人們對于環(huán)境破壞的憂慮。斯科特辯解說水下開采將比陸地開采帶來的環(huán)境破壞少得多：由于是直接在海底作業(yè)，因此將不會有大量的巖石廢料。由石油工業(yè)在海底鋪設(shè)的管線而留下的永久建筑，在采礦業(yè)中將不會出現(xiàn)。但是在開采啟動之前，政府仍需相信這些辯解中提到的優(yōu)點。