“If we’re serious about dealing with climate change, we’re not going to deep-sea mine,” Earle told me when we spoke, her voice low and emphatic. “This is the last best chance we will ever have to hold the planet steady. Our highest priority must be to safeguard whatever remains of the natural carbon-capturing systems, whether it’s an old-growth forest, an intact desert, a grassland—and by far the largest, relatively undisturbed, intact part of the planet is the deep sea. And it should be hands off.”
