The world needs more battery metals. Time to mine the seabed

Burning fuel to move humans and goods by road produced about 6bn tonnes of carbon dioxide in 2021, 16% of global energy-related emissions. If countries are to curb the increase in the world’s temperature, they must stop these emissions. That means building battery-powered vehicles which run on electricity rather than internal combustion. And that in turn means on an unprecedented scale.Take , which is used in the part of a battery that stores energy. The International Energy Agency reckons 80m tonnes of it must be mined between now and 2040 if the world is to hit its climate targets. That is more nickel than has ever been mined, and approaches the 100m tonnes of global unmined reserves measured by the United States Geological Survey.