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Projek pasir, Kuari didakwa jejaskan ekosistem alam sekitar

LUMUT: Tujuh pertubuhan bukan kerajaan (NGO) mengulangi gesaan supaya Kawasan Sensitif Alam Sekitar (KSAS) di mukim Segari dalam daerah Manjung, dekat sini dilindungi dan di­pulihara daripada sebarang ke­giatan yang boleh mengancam ekosistem semula jadi serta ke­sejahteraan alam sekitar.

Gesaan itu dibuat berikutan kebimbangan terhadap beberapa kegiatan dan projek yang sedang dan akan dilakukan di situ tidak selari dengan dasar dan ketetapan termasuk rancangan pemajuan sama di peringkat negeri serta Persekutuan.

Pegawai Lapangan Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM) yang mewakili tujuh NGO itu, Meor Razak Meor Abdul Rahman berkata, kerajaan negeri harus mengambil berat perkara berkenaan sebelum kemusnahan berlaku di KSAS khususnya enam aktiviti atau projek yang sedang dan akan dilaksanakan di situ.

Katanya, kerosakan terhadap KSAS di Segari sekali gus me­ngancam kawasan pendaratan penyu, kawasan habitat hidupan laut yang menjadi sumber penangkapan nelayan dan mengganggu kawasan rayau hidupan liar.

“Ancaman terhadap ekosistem semula jadi dan kesejahteraan alam sekitar juga memberi impak semasa dan tempoh jangka panjang terhadap sosio ekonomi masyarakat setempat terutama golongan nelayan dan sektor pelancongan di Pantai Teluk Se­nangin,” katanya semalam.

Menurut Meor Razak, antara aktiviti dan projek yang sedang dilakukan dan akan dilakukan adalah pengambilan pasir di Pantai Pasir Panjang, pembalakan secara tebang habis untuk tujuan projek kuari seluas kira-kira 122 hektar di sebahagian Kompartmen 19, 20 dan 21, Hutan Simpan Segari Melintang (HS Segari Melintang);
Projek akuakultur di sebahagian Kompartmen 34, HS Segari Melintang, cadangan kilang besi dan keluli di Pantai Pasir Panjang, cadangan loji pempro­sesan minyak dan petrokimia di Tanjung Hantu serta cadangan kompleks cerapan Baitul Hilal bersebelahan Baitul Hilal di Pantai Pasir Panjang.

“Semua projek dan aktiviti yang sedang dan akan dilakukan itu bakal mengancam kawasan pesisiran pantai dan kawasan penangkapan nelayan serta memusnahkan hutan semula jadi hutan bukit pantai,” katanya.

“Ia juga menyebabkan pencemaran air Sungai Gelam, mengancam kawasan pendaratan penyu dan sektor pelancongan serta memusnahkan hutan semula jadi bukit pantai,” katanya di semalam.

Menurutnya, berdasarkan dokumen Rancangan Fizikal Negara (RFN), semua kawasan pendaratan penyu di Semenanjung Malaysia dikategori sebagai KSAS Tahap 1 dan 2 yang tidak boleh dibangunkan dengan sebarang kegiatan dan penukaran guna tanah seperti perindustrian, perlombongan dan pengkuarian kecuali kegiatan ekopelancongan yang berimpak rendah, pendidikan dan penyelidikan sahaja.

Beliau berkata bahawa kawasan pantai dari Hutan Lipur Pasir Panjang hingga ke Pantai Pasir Pandak, Tanjung Hantu, adalah kawasan yang kerap direkodkan pendaratan penyu berdasarkan kepada penemuan sarang dan kutipan telur oleh pengutip telur penyu yang dilantik oleh Jabatan Perikanan.

“Malah dimaklumkan, kawasan pantai dan beting pasir di muara sungai merupakan kawasan sarang penyu paling banyak ditemui,” katanya. – UTUSAN

Metals Co

The Metals Co is funding research to explore a mineral-rich region called the Clarion-Clipperton zone (Source: metals.co)

 

The minerals needed to produce cleaner power are abundant on the bottom of the ocean

MINING the deep oceans for cobalt, nickel, rare earths and other metals could accelerate the world’s conversion to renewable power sources. These minerals are hard to obtain on land, where mining has also created hazards for communities and workers, but can be found in abundance right on top of the ocean floor.

The problem is that the bottom of the sea isn’t one uniform environment but has its own mountains and valleys and unique ecosystems, some of them unexplored. The areas with all the minerals are among the most mysterious. They’re also rich with weird life forms — lobster-sized shrimp and transparent fish, alien-looking anemones, and sea urchins that seem to gallop across the seafloor.

One of the companies gearing up to do the mining — The Metals Co, based in Canada — is funding research to explore a mineral-rich region called the Clarion-Clipperton zone. It’s a vast, oblong patch of seafloor between Mexico and Hawaii, more than two miles below the surface of the Pacific. What those expeditions turned up was not just weird life but a whole weird system in which the mineral-containing rocks, which the scientists call nodules, might be generating some of the oxygen that the habitat’s animals are breathing.

Deep-sea mining is sometimes portrayed as a story of greedy capitalists versus good scientists, but reality is rarely so clear-cut. As global warming accelerates, we’ll be faced with countermeasures that lead to other forms of environmental harm. We’ll have to choose between curbing our consumption and adopting technology in various shades of dirty green.

The deep sea is so hard to reach that scientists and capitalists often end up working together to reach it. For example, findings in a recent Nature Geoscience paper came about in part with funding from The Metals Co.

The lead author of the paper, Andrew Sweetman of the Scottish Association for Marine Science, noticed something odd during a 2013 expedition to study oxygen consumption in the deep sea.

The oxygen in our planet’s oceans and atmosphere normally comes from photosynthesis. It’s too dark for that to happen two miles below the surface of the sea. Dissolved oxygen can be carried to the deep via currents, where it’s used up by living things, Sweetman said. And yet his sensors showed oxygen was also being produced way down there. He had the sensors recalibrated, but they still showed oxygen levels increasing. He told his students to throw the sensors in the waste bin.

Then, in 2021, with funding from The Metals Co, he tried measuring oxygen with a different method involving chemical titration. The increase didn’t disappear. He and his colleagues then brought up a sample of deep-sea rocks for various experiments.

They continued to make oxygen, which he dubbed “dark oxygen”. He considered the possibility that these metal-rich nodules were acting like natural batteries. He teamed up with an electrochemist who helped him measure a voltage — enough to separate water into hydrogen and oxygen.

The nodules grow at the astoundingly slow rate of about a few mm per million years, so these undersea environments are tens or hundreds of millions of years old, said Sweetman. And some creatures only live on the nodules.

The finding could have big implications for the understanding of the evolution of life on this planet and on other worlds with oceans — including moons of Jupiter and Saturn that NASA has plans to explore.

Not everyone is convinced. One of the researchers employed by The Metals Co told New Scientist he plans to write a rebuttal, arguing that it’s probably an error from contamination.

For his part, Sweetman doesn’t consider his finding, even if replicated, to be a reason to nix all mining plans — only to wait a little longer to understand the deep sea and how to limit mining to preserve the life down there. The minerals brought up could accelerate the race to wean ourselves from fossil fuels, he said, and climate change effects the seas as well as the land. “Everyone’s wanting their brand-new cell phone and a brand-new computer and an electric car (EV),” he said. “We need to make some tough decisions.”

The metals would be useful not just for EV batteries, but for systems that store and transport solar and wind energy, said Jennifer Dunn, a professor of biological and chemical engineering at Northwestern University. But AI also creates an insatiable market for some of the same hard-to-obtain minerals — which might make it hard to avoid getting greedy.

The trade-offs wouldn’t be so stark if people were willing to change their lifestyles. For example, Americans could invest in more public transportation — and actually use it. Dunn recalls the mocking reaction of Americans when former President Jimmy Carter suggested in 1977 that we turn our thermostats down in the winter and wear sweaters.

She said undersea mining shouldn’t be taken off the table because the consequences of unabated global warming are so dangerous, but we need to know more about the risks. Could there be some unanticipated disaster like the Deepwater Horizon oil spill? Scientists would have to assess not just the environmental impacts if everything went as planned but also the impacts if things went wrong.

Deep-sea habitats aren’t going to regenerate once they’re disturbed, at least not any time soon — so mining too aggressively could cause irreversible damage, possibly driving species to extinction before humanity even knows they exist. Climate change is, of course, posing the same kind of threat. There are no easy choices ahead of us. — BLOOMBERG

Batu Putih

PORT DICKSON – Agensi Nuklear Malaysia bekerjasama dengan pakar luar negara bagi membangunkan akta atau perundangan khususnya dalam aktiviti membabitkan perlombongan nadir bumi (REE) di negara ini.

Ketua Pengarahnya, Dr. Rosli Darmawan berkata, langkah itu perlu memandangkan akta serta perundangan tersebut amat penting dalam menjaga kelestarian alam sekitar di masa akan datang.

Menurutnya, REE kini merupakan salah satu hasil yang sedang cuba dibangunkan Kerajaan dan pihaknya mempunyai teknologi dalam memastikan cara atau kaedah melombong REE mempunyai tatacara pengendalian piawai (SOP)nya.

“Kita ada bekerjasama dengan pakar dari luar negara seperti dari negara China dan kita dalam proses bangunkan juga akta perundangan supaya melombong (REE) ada SOP serta cara menjaga kelestarian alam sekitar.

“Ini penting bagi memastikan (alam) tak tercemar dengan cara melombong seperti yang ditinggalkan penjajah terdahulu,” katanya kepada pemberita selepas Majlis Perasmian Seminar dan Bengkel Penulisan dan Penerbitan Saintifik 2024, di sini, hari ini.

Semalam, Perdana Menteri Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim menegaskan Malaysia perlu memanfaatkan sepenuhnya potensi besar industri REE terutamanya daripada sumber tempatan. – KOSMO! ONLINE

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KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 5 (Bernama) -- Malaysia perlu memanfaatkan sepenuhnya potensi besar industri nadir bumi (REE) terutamanya daripada sumber tempatan, kata Perdana Menteri Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.

Sewaktu mempengerusikan Mesyuarat Majlis Tindakan Ekonomi Negara (MTEN) Bilangan 6 Tahun 2024 Anwar menegaskan kerjasama dengan pemain antarabangsa yang memiliki kepakaran perlu didasarkan kepada matlamat akhir membangunkan keseluruhan rantaian industri dalam negara.

“Aktiviti penguatkuasaan juga perlu diperkemas bagi mengelak sumber negara dieksploitasi, yang akan mengurangkan hasil kepada Kerajaan dan merencat pembangunan industri REE negara.

“Mesyuarat juga meneliti cadangan rangka kerja termasuk anjakan besar bagi menjadikan Malaysia sebagai destinasi pilihan untuk menjalankan perniagaan, selaras kedudukan semasa negara dalam indeks daya saing global,” kata beliau menerusi hantaran di laman media sosialnya hari ini.

Anwar berkata kerajaan yakin usaha-usaha ini akan dapat meningkatkan keyakinan pelabur dan seterusnya memperkukuh asas ekonomi negara.

-- BERNAMA

 

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The five minerals identified as strategic in Malaysia’s plan are non-radioactive rare earth elements, bauxite, tin ore, silica sand and kaolin. — Reuters pic

KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 2 — With climate change and decarbonisation at the forefront of the global agenda, rare earth elements have taken centre stage in the move to a more sustainable future.

This group of 17 elements are critical components in clean energy technologies and products central to decarbonisation.

Projections from the International Energy Agency indicate that the rush for more clean energy applications and demand for electric vehicles and their batteries have driven up the demand for these critical minerals.

And Malaysia is well-placed to capitalise on this increased demand.

Demand to overtake supply

Although supply is projected to remain steady for the next five to seven years, demand is projected to overtake supply in the longer term.

A large portion of the world’s rare earths elements are located in areas which make them too expensive to mine, such as in oceans, and thus the concern over supply.

This is a boon for developing countries which are resource-rich in these critical minerals and are therefore keen to seize the increase in demand to join emerging new supply chains and to use these mineral resources to finance development.

It is therefore not surprising that interest in mining activities in Malaysia, which was once famous for tin exports, has revived in line with the rise in global interest.

Malaysia’s National Mineral Industry Transformation Plan 2021-2030 launched in 2021, aims to develop the national mineral industry sustainably along the entire value chain as a new source of growth for the country.

It has mapped mineral resources across the country including metallic minerals such as copper, tin, iron, manganese and gold and non-metallic minerals which include diamond, dolomite, gypsum, mica, amethyst and quartz. These minerals have an extensive presence in every state of Malaysia.

The plan revealed that Malaysia has a total of RM4.11 trillion worth of mineral resources, including RM745 billion ringgit worth of rare earths. The estimated value of metallic minerals alone is RM1.03 trillion.

Metallic minerals such as nickel, manganese, copper, and aluminium are used in EV battery production. Rare earth elements are used in the development of magnets that form the main propulsion motors in EVs.

Supply of critical minerals and rare earth elements comes only from a few countries.

The five minerals identified as strategic in Malaysia’s plan are non-radioactive rare earth elements, bauxite, tin ore, silica sand and kaolin.

Of the five, non-radioactive rare earth elements have the highest estimated value. Hence, the focus is on tapping this mineral to help aid national development goals.

In 2014, the Malaysian Academy of Science together with the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation suggested a blueprint for the establishment of a rare earth elements industry in the country as a new source of growth.

More than just mining

A critical component of this plan was the development of midstream and downstream activities — rather than a mere focus on mining alone — as this will increase related value-adding activities in the country.

Midstream refers to the transformation of minerals into refined products through separation and purification while downstream activities use these refined products in manufacturing such as EV batteries, smartphones, televisions and computers.

The suggested blueprint was not adopted, and the government came up with the National Mineral Industry Transformation Plan.

Like the blueprint, the plan emphasised that mining activities should not only be upstream-focused but also take into consideration downstream activity development as the way forward in mineral resource exploitation.

The country’s New Industrial Master Plan 2030 launched in September 2023 also calls for downstream development by using mineral resources to manufacture advanced materials, although what types of advanced materials are left to be determined by market players.

Advanced materials are used in technology applications including camcorders, aircraft, spacecraft, computers and fibre optics.

The Malaysian Investment Development Authority is courting foreign direct investment for the downstream development of the rare earths elements industry.

The government, meanwhile, imposed a moratorium on the export of unprocessed rare earth minerals in January.

The duration of the moratorium is not known and whether this will eventually lead to an export ban of unprocessed rare earth minerals is a matter of speculation.

Critical minerals-based development is not without its challenges.As noted by the International Energy Agency, local and regional development can be affected by even small-scale mineral development.

The first challenge is the use of the land where the unmined minerals are located. Deforestation is a key concern in the exploitation of these minerals. For example, the surge in nickel mining in Indonesia since 2019 has led to a loss of 76,301 hectares of forests — the size of New York City — escalating the destruction of biodiversity and habitats of some endangered species.

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The forest conundrum

The locations of rare earth elements in Malaysia are near or in forests which are high-carbon stock areas. High concentrations of carbon contained in forests play a critical role in mitigating climate change as they absorb and store huge volumes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Malaysia is proposing to use in-situ leaching for rare earths mining as it will be less environmentally damaging since there is minimal soil excavation.

However, there is still a possibility that continuous chemical use can contaminate underground water resources or nearby rivers.

Studies on the impact of in-situ leaching practices in China since the late 1960s have shown that there is pollution of surface water in mining areas.

Nevertheless, the Malaysian Department of Minerals and Geoscience said in October last year that its findings from an in-situ leaching pilot project for the mining of non-radioactive rare earth elements in Perak avoided contamination.

It remains to be seen if the findings of one pilot project upends the evidence available from China’s experience in using this method.

Who pays the rent

Mineral rents can be a useful source of income for fostering development.

These are payments made to governments for the extraction of minerals within their borders. Perak, for example, was reported to have received RM1.66 million in royalty payments from the production of rare earth carbonates from its pilot project.

The mineral was exported to China after the royalty amount was paid by the project developer. The prospect of making a quick buck from selling rare earth elements has led to reports of illegal mining in Negeri Sembilan.

Unfortunately, there is no public disclosure on the mechanisms for royalty payments except when there is a query in parliament. Neither is there any disclosure on the division of mineral royalty payments between the Malaysian federal and state governments.

For natural resources, which are limited in supply, the conversion of this type of natural capital into physical capital that can drive development is critical but the road towards capturing mineral rents for this use is riddled with governance issues including political integrity, data disclosure, taxation frameworks and economic priorities.

It is not realistic to expect countries and mining companies to abandon the exploitation of mineral resources.

A more balanced approach is to make the development of these resources and their continued exploitation subject to better governance, transparency and accountability at the state, national and global levels.

* Professor Tham Siew Yean is a visiting senior fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, Singapore and Emeritus Professor at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia and Neo Hui Yun Rebecca is a research officer at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute.

** This article was first published in 360info.

*** This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of Malay Mail.

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