Exploring and Exploiting Deep Ocean Space

Jules Verne’s life was framed by the second phase of the British Industrial Revolution. In his nineteenth-century world, a transition to steam occurred. It was a time of rapid technological developments and explorations of every corner of the Earth’s surface. Then the world population clock ticked slowly and was well below 1.3 billion. Today, more than 7.8 billion people live in the fourth phase of that revolution, and the world population clock is ticking faster and faster. To solve our urgent demand for resources, we will shortly exploit the unknown treasure troves of deep ocean space. However, only some 15% of the ocean floor is mapped in detail, and less than 0.0001% of the deep-sea is explored. Since the 1990s a transition to global operational oceanography is occurring, with advanced monitoring systems, new technology like Argo floats, gliders and state-of-the-art ocean modelling. A new wave of ocean exploration is urgently needed, as is an adaptation of the prevailing international legislation, to keep up with the coming sustainable exploitation of ocean space. Blue resources discussed in this chapter are: fisheries, bioprospecting and deep-sea mining. In a low-carbon society, citizens should be aware of and be involved in this through ocean literacy.