Green Giants – Episode 106

Wes Ashworth (04:14)

I love a lot what you said there. Just again, kind of back to that sort of translating, bringing these people together as well. I love the focus there on the purpose, you know, and really tapping into that and finding that as well too. I think, your progression matters too. You’ve seen sustainability from inside real industrial systems, not just from the outside looking in. I think it you just a really unique lens when you’ve seen so many of those different areas out in the real industry and real world. As we kind of get into this, before we get into a little bit of the debate and talking through deep sea mining, help us set the stage. What exactly does The Metals Company do? What are polymetallic nodules and how do they fit into the energy transition?

Erica Ocampo (04:56)

There is this area called the Clarion–Clipperton zone between Mexico and Hawaii. At depths of roughly 4,000 to 6,000 meters deep, there are these potato-sized rocks sitting unattached on the seafloor called polymetallic nodules. These nodules contain nickel, cobalt, copper, and manganese, which are metals used in energy, infrastructure, and defense technologies. TMC has been studying one section of this area of the Clarion–Clipperton Zone, the area called NORI-D since 2011. We’ve been developing collection technology and conducting environmental baseline studies to understand impacts and mitigation strategies before we start operations.

Wes Ashworth (05:38)

Yeah, I appreciate you setting the stage here. I think the context is important because the phrase deep sea mining can create just an immediate reaction before people really understand what’s actually being proposed and what’s actually being done. That gives us a starting point. The metals company TMC is looking at a potential new source of critical minerals. Those minerals sit underneath a huge part of the energy transition. Now I want to step back and talk about the broader materials challenge because this is where the conversation becomes much bigger than one company or one technology. A lot of people support the energy transition without thinking deeply about the minerals underneath it, what do you think the average person doesn’t understand about its physical reality?

Erica Ocampo (06:14)

I think that most people support the energy transition without realizing how metal intensive it actually is. For example, we are expected to mine more copper in the next 30 years than humanity has mined in the last 120 years. That’s huge. It is not just about scale. It’s also about concentration. Over 70% of cobalt comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC. Over 60% of nickel comes from Indonesia. Much of this processing is controlled by Chinese-owned entities. This isn’t just an environmental challenge, huge scale challenge. It’s also a geopolitical challenge, an ethics challenge, an affordability challenge. There are many layers to this topic.

Wes Ashworth (07:01)

Yeah, absolutely. It’s such an important point. The energy transition can sound abstract, but it is incredibly physical. I think it’s easy to talk about electrification without really seeing the supply chains and materials behind it. Kind of going back again to your career, so you’ve spent time in metals recycling, which many people would see as the good guy solution in recycling. But what did that experience teach you about why recycling is essential but not quite enough?

Erica Ocampo (07:24)

Working in metals recycling was eye-opening because I went in thinking, this is the solution, right? It is absolutely part of the solution. We need much more investment in recycling and it’s urgently needed. But recycling can only recover materials that already exist in circulation. These metals are often locked inside electric vehicles, buildings, bridges, and infrastructures for decades. Right now, global recycling rates are already pretty decent, like over 60% for cobalt and nickel and over 50% for manganese and copper. But even if we recycle 100% of these metals by 2050, we will only have reduced new mining demand by about 20 to 30%. That’s how big the demand challenge is.

Wes Ashworth (08:12)

It’s a huge gap. I think the distinction is really useful where recycling is necessary, but it can’t carry the entire load by itself. I think a lot of people need to hear that without feeling like it diminishes the importance of recycling. We need that as well too, and as much as we can get of it, but it’s not enough. You said something I think very important to me in a previous conversation is, we can only recycle what we have already mined. What does that really mean for nickel, cobalt, copper, and manganese over the next 20 to 30 years?

Erica Ocampo (08:38)

Copper is one of the materials we had mined for a long time. Even then we have to mine so much more coming up. I just gonna give you a point of reference. Between 2017 and 2024, we have a huge exponential grow in many minerals like lithium and cobalt production increased by 3.5 and 2.4 times respectively, while nickel production grew 71% during that time frame. Even after ramping up production so significantly during the time, by 2040, it’s expected that the demand for these materials will increase even more. We’re talking 11 times for manganese, more than seven times for nickel, more than four times for cobalt, more than three times for copper. To contain climate change, more critical metals will need to be mined in the next 30 years than have been extracted throughout all human history.

Wes Ashworth (09:30)

Yeah, it helps explain why this is not just a values conversation. It’s also a timing and scale conversation and just kind of dealing with the reality of what’s there. When people say, and I know we’ve started to touch on this, but I just want to bring it home. When people say, why not just reduce demand, substitute materials, and just recycle more? What part of that argument do you agree with? Where does it run into the limits of time, scale and physics that we’ve started to get into?

Erica Ocampo (09:53)

I actually agree with parts of that. We should absolutely reduce wasteful consumption. I mean, and we as consumers have the power to be more mindful and thoughtful about the decisions we make, the use of resources we make. Simple decisions, you know, like, do I need to drive here instead of taking public transport? Do I need to ask a bazillion questions to AI? Do I need to save this many photos? You know, simple questions like that. But a lot of future demand, when we said reduce demand, most of that demand will come from developing countries trying to improve the quality of life. That’s an ethical question, right? It is difficult to tell them, hey, you should stop developing. But so it’s kind of a balance.

Substitution is important too, like let’s find a replacement. But many of these minerals work across different applications. Not only most substitutions take years to develop, commercialize and scale, assuming that the market will adopt them, but also they might not work for all the applications. Many of those are not true replacements, right? It might be just kind of an additional solution. This is a portfolio challenge and there is not just one solution that this material is going to fix at all. It is a moving force of a huge established supply change that needs to be transforming.

Wes Ashworth (11:16)

Yeah, I appreciate the framing because it avoids turning us into a false choice between recycling and new supply. I say this literally on show all the time, but it is an and not an or. We need all of it. need an and in both of these things and a lot of different technologies, a lot of different solutions. I think sometimes people just look for that magic bullet, you know, like thing that’s just this perfect solution and it just doesn’t exist. Maybe it will one day, but we’ve got to start where we are today. I think that’s really, really important.

I’ll change a little bit to China’s role because I think their role in mineral processing is central to this story. How should energy transition leaders think about the fact that critical mineral supply chains are not just environmental systems, but they are geopolitical systems?

Erica Ocampo (11:57)

This was one of the biggest wake up calls in recycling. China intentionally spent decades, and they told us, building dominance on minerals, supply chain, and the mining part and processing. Today, it controls well over half directly or indirectly of mining and processing for copper, nickel, cobalt, lithium, graphite, rare metals, you name it. They own it. That level of control over such a critical mineral supply by any country, in particular one that we have challenging relationships with, can be used, and it has been used as a negotiating chip. This is something that I think people are realizing more because geopolitics are playing such a big role in today’s society. I think this is one layer of the story that I think is getting more attention now.

Wes Ashworth (12:47)

Yeah, it’s where this becomes much bigger than procurement or sustainability. You know, it’s a reminder that supply chains are not neutral. You know, they shape power, risk, and resilience. I think it’s always important that we look at just the whole holistic picture, all these factors, and all the things that come into play. I appreciate you highlighting that. You know, we’re looking at too, ore grades are declining. We’ve talked about the demand is rising, and it will continue to rise. Many land-based resources are located in biodiverse or socially vulnerable regions. How do you weigh the environmental and human costs of the status quo?

Erica Ocampo (13:18)

For those listeners that don’t really know what ore grade means, it means that the valuable thing that you extract, you need to extract a lot more of the whole waste for you to get that piece that you want. Today, you know, out of like everything that you extract, only less than 2% is valuable material and that is the grade that it continues to decline. Mines is less than 1%, so everything else becomes waste.

We all know that mining is challenging and we all can complain about it and it still benefit tremendously from it. The reality is that minerals exist where geology places them, not where we want. For nickel and cobalt, that means forest. Can mining be done better? Yes, and sure, absolutely. It has in some facilities. But when you add an exponential demand growth like the one we’re seeing, and the need to quickly scale up, it pushes the ability and willingness of these countries and the governments of these countries to enforce the environmental and social protections needed for mining to be done responsibly.

Wes Ashworth (14:24)

Yeah, absolutely. It’s a key point. I think the reminder that doing nothing, of like maintaining the status quo that we’re doing now does not mean there is no impact in some respects means, you know, there’s a worse impact than what your solution has, you know, and kind of looking at like, what’s the better solution and the least impact? That comparison does matter because every pathway has consequences, even the ones we’re more familiar with or comfortable with. I think it’s important to hit on that. For me, the picture is clear here. Demand is growing, recycling matters, but can’t close the entire gap in the near term, and the current mineral system already carries real environmental, social, geopolitical costs.

That brings us to the heart of the debate around The Metals Company, whether deep sea nodules can be part of this answer and how to talk about that without oversimplifying it. You said, you know, some of what you shared, is like your own first reaction to deep sea mining was basically, you know, mining is already hard enough and now we’re, you know, talking about the deep sea. What changed when you kind of got into it more and put your engineer’s hat on?

Erica Ocampo (15:22)

Yeah, that was a real reaction of a skepticism. It’s like, it’s already hard. Now we’re going to go to the oceans. Oh my god. When I looked at the engineering of this process, the environmental science, and start looking at the system level comparisons of what it means to do this process for this specific ore in this specific area as compared to the specific terrestrial mining. I realized that the collection of unattached nodules in one of the least biologically productive areas on earth might deserve serious consideration compared to deforestation or displacement on land. I think what’s kind of, I called myself out too is like, you’re being such a hypocrite. You’re an engineer, you’re a sustainability professional, and this is a difficult challenge, but you are well suited to take it on. You enjoy all modern living technologies. I decided to face my own dissonance, get fascinated by the science and technology and decided that this was a good solution to join.

Wes Ashworth (16:26)

Yeah, I appreciate so much that your starting point was not blind enthusiasm. I love that you’re just open to sharing your real reaction. That makes the conversation to me feel more honest. That initial discomfort is probably where a lot of listeners began too. Again, I appreciate that a lot.

For listeners out there who have never pictured this before, how does polymetallic nodule collection actually work from the sea floor to the surface? What’s actually happening there?

Erica Ocampo (16:51)

Imagine you are 4,000-6,000 meters deep. OK, this is really deep. There’s no light. When there’s no light, there’s no plants. The entire plant kingdom is gone. Then there is high pressures, low temperatures, and most of life there exists in the form of bacteria. Very unique bacteria. There is a collector vehicle that pushes water jets parallel to the seafloor to dislodge and lift these nodules, which are sitting unattached on that sediment seafloor.

Then it passes over them and sucks them in into a chamber that separates the nodules from the sediment that was entailed with them. Most of the sediment is discharged towards the back of the vehicle and the nodules with less than 5% of the remaining sediments are sent through a riser pipe to a surface vessel, a ship, where then is the water and then is getting ready for transportation for onshore processing.

Wes Ashworth (17:44)

The visual is really helpful because it makes the concept so much more concrete. To me, as you’re going through that, it’s so non-invasive and water going underneath them. They’re unattached. To me, that sounds like a pretty good solution. When you think about traditional mining, there’s a very different picture emerges. But the picture you’re painting, it’s kind of like, OK, that doesn’t sound bad at all.

I think once people can picture the process, they can engage with the risks and trade-offs more thoughtfully. The technology, you’ve just explained it. It can sound deceptively simple, like almost like a vacuum cleaner on the seafloor, but operating, as you said, 4,000 to 6,000 meters deep. You said sort of light. Anything else that kind of makes that environment so difficult?

Erica Ocampo (18:24)

Yeah, I mean, first of all, the ocean is humongous. Even if you think a vessel is big, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean is like a little dot. It’s like nothing. You are working not only with the challenges of high pressure and low temperatures to have that collector vehicle operate at that depth, but then maintaining the riser pipe that is there between the collector vehicle and the vessel on the surface. They need to align constantly. Then you have the ocean moving. To keep it aligned and to keep like this dynamic post position in between the both of them is quite remarkable.

Wes Ashworth (18:59)

It really is. It’s fascinating because the concept may sound simple, but the operating environment is anything but simple. It really puts the engineering challenge into perspective. TMC often frames nodules as a complementary solution, not a silver bullet, which we’ve talked about a little bit. What’s your take on that? What’s the most honest version of that claim?

Erica Ocampo (19:17)

I love that claim because, my God, we always look for the savior. I think all these movies have in our mind that we’re going to find one hero, but actually each of us can be heroes in a small way. The most honest version will be that DSM is not going to end terrestrial mining. It is not going to address all the metal needs. We are really specific about the minerals found in these nodules in this area, nickel, cobalt, copper, manganese, and some rare earth metals. The challenge is still humongous. This is one piece of the puzzle that we can help solve.

Wes Ashworth (19:51)

Yeah, it’s an important distinction because the energy transition, as you said, has had too many silver bullet narratives, you know, already. Mentally, I think we’re conditioned just to think that way, whether it’s the movies, as you said, that, hey, this hero comes in and saves the day. But to your point, I love that. Like, we can all be heroes. We can all have our piece of the puzzle and making this work. It is all needed. It’s all necessary. I really like that frame because it leaves room for multiple solutions instead of forcing everything into one answer.

 I think the other thing people get wrong, too, is just they want this perfect answer right away. That’s how progress really works. You start with a solution, you make that solution better, you find alternative solutions that are a little better and then, you know, slow improvement continues to happen and happen and happen. Eventually, you end up down the road and you’re like, wow, I can’t believe we were ever there, but it’s hard. You can’t just jump there and skip steps.

Kind of getting more into this. The strongest critics of deep sea mining argue that we should not industrialize one of the least understood ecosystems on earth. If you were sort of steel manning their case, what’s, what’s the best argument against your own industry? What’s your take on a little bit of that?

Erica Ocampo (20:50)

I think that critics raise valid concerns by saying, don’t industrialize the least understood ecosystem on earth is an overly broad statement. The ocean covers 70% of earth. About 70% of that is abyssal plains, which is where this nodule field sit. NORI-D the specific NORI-D area, is one of the most studied abyssal areas in the Pacific Ocean. We should debate specifics, no broad slogans.

Wes Ashworth (21:20)

Yeah, I agree with that. Wholeheartedly and I think that kind of answer just builds trust because it shows you understand the strongest version of the concern. I think it’s important for listeners to hear that criticism taken seriously rather than then brushed aside and kind of just talking through it honestly and openly. It’s amazing anybody that hasn’t seen it You know if you look at the globe and you look at that other side of the globe, know where the land isn’t it is just massive. That that perspective is rarely shown, but it is essentially all water.

The research around TMC’s 2022 NORI-D Collector trial shows real impacts in indirectly disturbed tracks, including reduced, you know, macrophonal density and species richness, while plume impacts appear more nuanced and site-specific. I guess, how do you interpret that evidence responsibly without minimizing it or overstating it?

Erica Ocampo (22:07)

I will start by saying that every extractic industry in the world is going to have an impact on the receiving environment. That’s what we went to test. When we collected the nodules from these fields, we are effectively changing one ecosystem type to a, the abyssal plains comes with nodule fields and without nodule fields. We’re changing a type of nodule field to one without nodule field. Even though it’s still a diesel planes. We are effectively making them transformation. What was so important about this pilot trial is that it helped us create confidence in the modeling we have to be able to adapt this system, the technology of collection to continue to minimize impact.

There are different levels of impact influence. The most impact we have is right on the tracks. Because the collector vehicle doesn’t sit, dig in, it has some buoyancy and it still leaves some tracks about three to five centimeters deep. That’s probably the removal of the collector and that track is the biggest impact. But then the sediment was a concern about how far it could travel. Then we learned how far it can travel, how actually impacts because it travels. We learned that it doesn’t travel as far. That the seafloor when we came back a year later to see how the receiving environment adjusted to the impact we created a year prior to that. We see a lot of encouraging results because the receiving environment is adjusting and adapting and recovering at a much better rate than we expected. This is still a lot more information to be done once we have a process happening. Then when we say we’re going to start operating, we mean we will continue this research program to continue to understand the impacts of an operations in this environment. But the results are very encouraging. I will not try to tell people that there is no impact, but I will say, oh my god, it’s so much less impact.

Wes Ashworth (24:07)

Yeah, absolutely. The nuance matters. You know, I think the serious conversation is not impact or no impact. It’s what kind, how much, where, and compared to what. You’re talking three to five, centimeters, as you said, like not a lot there. But I appreciate that because it’s exactly where the conversation needs precision instead of slogans.

What level of impact is, you know, acceptable? Who gets to decide and what evidence should be required before commercial scale up from your perspective?

Erica Ocampo (24:31)

It’s a good question. I mean, to me, my personal self without the engineering hat is like, no impact should be allowed. But obviously my existence alone is impacting the planet. That said, I think we have processes, existing processes, terrestrial, which show kind of a baseline of what the current impact is. I think anything new should be lower than that. That should be like the threshold of acceptance. To me, it’s not a hard threshold.

Then when it comes to the evidence, that depends who you ask. If you ask business and governments, they are going to tell you we need to base the decision on risk. That’s what we’re doing. We are assessing all the risks. We’re looking at the likelihood of this risk to happen. we are creating mitigating strategies for to minimize those risks and the impact of those potential risks. If they are acceptable and manageable, then that’s when you can start doing commercial operations.

Who gets to decide that I think is depends who you ask, because if you are a scientist, I guess the answer will be, I need absolute scientific certainty. Which, by the way, we have not achieved on any terrestrial ecosystem either, but it depends who you ask. But if you ask businesses and governments, it will have to be risk-based.

Wes Ashworth (25:49)

Yeah, it’s a really good perspective to consider and looking at it as risk-based. I like that analogy. I think a lot of things are just kind of balancing that and risk reward and just kind of minimizing it, finding an acceptable solution and really kind of striking balance. I think that’s where it’s at.

The environmental debate is central, you know, as we covered there, but not the whole story. You’ve brought up something that often gets missed is the human and social impacts of the materials we already use. We sort of briefly touched on that and just a rare opportunity to build guardrails before a new industry scales, which can be an exciting opportunity. I want to move there next.

You’ve said the social impact piece often gets missed because there are no human communities living on the abyssal sea floor. What social impacts of land-based mining do you think people fail to see?

Erica Ocampo (26:35)

You know, I’m not going to say that terrestrial mining is all evil and brings all negative because it also brings positives to the communities, right? Economic, jobs, education, these kind of things. But definitely has have a long history of severe environmental and social impacts, you know, that makes this ethos of the energy transition kind of challenging. Resource extraction by nature is going to be the structured process that often starts with the displacement or change the land use of these areas for local communities and indigenous peoples.

Depending on the location, depending on the protections that our government gives, because these are different jurisdictions, we kind of start looking at, you know, mountains flatten or as we talk about all these mine waste. because only a little piece is what we’re looking and everything else becomes mine waste. Would you have to create these waste, mine waste dams and tailings? If it’s in a tropical area, it’s gonna rain and it is very hard to contain all these things. That means there’s gonna be pollution of the water resources, of the air for local communities creating health issues. We’re talking also some conflict, right? The communities are not supported. This has been a lot of conflicts that might be dam failures, as you have seen sometimes on the news that the containment of all these mineways kind of erodes entire area below that dam.

Many people have learned about child labor in places like the DRC. That’s one of the worst cases, right? Or the blood diamonds, as people talk. We talk about human right abuses. Shortening the life spans of minors and even the loss of life. There are a lot of different challenges that people don’t see or understand because it’s not in the backyard.

But like, for example, if we bring this topic to the U.S. a report by MSCI found that the majority of the U.S. research for critical metals are located within 35 miles of native American reservations. There’s something that gives you pause. Right, because it doesn’t have to be that a mine is going to damage everything, but the guardrails have to be there to ensure it’s done responsibly. For that, you need a strong enforcement and partnership with the local communities.

Wes Ashworth (28:50)

Yeah, there’s so much to consider there and I’m curious just in your role and with your expertise, just how do you talk about harm across such different systems? You mentioned there are a like a rainforest, a mining community, know, supply chain controlled by geopolitics and a deep ocean ecosystem with organisms most people will never really see. How do you just talk about that and how does that come across when you’re communicating?

Erica Ocampo (29:12)

It is really challenging and it depends on how much time people give me, right? Because talking of many layers of this mineral supply chain challenge takes time. By the most people, I know aren’t going to invest that kind of time. They usually gravitate towards the one area that is most relevant to them. For most people, that is the environmental part. That’s why I think TMC spends so much time providing comparisons between our NORI-D project and key terrestrial routes.

But it really is challenging and we continue to miss the points of the discussion today because it requires time to be able to explain.

Wes Ashworth (29:49)

Yeah, I’ve said it a lot, but how just important communication and education is, you know, to what we’re doing and our future going forward. But for me, like this is one of the hardest parts of sustainability. It’s comparing things that don’t fit neatly on the same scale and kind of how you address when talk about them. It sounds like challenges, not only just measuring harm, but also communicating it responsibly. I think that’s always a key theme there.

One of the other hard questions here is whether deep sea mining reduces harm, shifts harm or creates a new category of harm, how do you think about that distinction? Like, what’s your take on that?

Erica Ocampo (30:25)

I wouldn’t have this question as a deep sea mining overarching question. I will have it a very specific question, right? I will say, TNC, NORI-D, polymetallic nodule project reduces harm. Yes, this reduced harm is now in a different ecosystem than, let’s say, nickel mining in Indonesia. But I wouldn’t say that necessarily creates a new category of harm because what is look at harm from the pathway is we look at the pathways of creating harm. This is specific to the projects.

You start looking at the risk assessment part of, okay, what are the potential risks? What is the likelihood of the risk? But also you need to look which resource in this case nodules operated or collected by whom the TMC with this technology. That’s when we can assess what are the potential pathways of harm and therefore assess it. That’s why I will say that for this project, we will be reducing harm.

Wes Ashworth (31:23)

Yeah, I agree. you know, am I 100% right? No, you know, I have my opinions, I’m wrong as much as the next person. But I agree, it feels to me like it is reducing harm when you really look at it, you analyze the facts and kind of see what you’re doing and the impact. I think that distinction is really important.

Another thing that we’ve started to touch on is you came to TMC partly because this is chance to help shape the guardrails before an industry really starts, which rarely is an option to do. What guardrails do you believe must exist from day one?

Erica Ocampo (31:51)

Well, this is one of the things that excites me the most about being part of a new industry. How many times we have this opportunity? We have the opportunity to do all these guardrails before we scale up. We can do the opposite that other industries have done, which is an afterthought.

We can have the requirements of an external environmental monitoring. We can demand for adaptive management systems to be happening and use all the new technology. We can demand for higher transparency. There is a pretty cool system that we have that will allow anybody from any computer to check where we are and what we’re doing when we’re operating. We can, you know, start talking about what is the level of science and who is going to be doing which part, what are the standards, what are the guidelines. How things should be collected and setting up the clear thresholds of operating.

One of the things I really like of being part of TMC is that we will likely be the first company to collect nodules in the sea floor. That means that we have the opportunity to raise the bar high. Not only is an environmental protection, but it’s a competitive advantage, right, to set the threshold, the bar high. That excites me because then we can have like real impact. Not only for NORI-D but for the industry overall.

Wes Ashworth (33:13)

Yeah, I agree. I think it is one the most interesting parts of the story. As you said, most industries build guardrails after the fact. It’s kind of historically how it’s happened. It gives me some hope for where we are now as a society. We’re starting to really think about these things before these industries really even get built and scaled out of setting these guardrails early and often. I love that. I think listeners will appreciate hearing what accountability should look like before commercial scale arrives just in general.

You have built ESG systems and sustainability reporting structures in large complex companies. How do you build an ESG system for a company that is still pre-commercial but already facing real scrutiny?

Erica Ocampo (33:55)

You build for where regulations are going, know where they are today. The amount of ESG data reporting requirements continues to increase. Right now we work with each team, including our partners like OCs. They have finance, strategy, operations, social engagement, and we show them what it is to come, what is the goal that we have as a company, and then we agree with them on a timeline for their yearly data improvements.

By then knowing that this is what is needed and the timeline enables them to proactively include these data points into their processes. We also are including language with a specific data points needs in our key supplier contracts. I love it because then I don’t have to like go back to systems and retrofit them. Now that they’re building them, they can include these from the start.

Wes Ashworth (34:47)

Yeah, and how, I guess how complicated is that? Like building it for sort of future, you kind of got to get out your crystal ball and look at the data and know where it’s headed. Like how do you strike that balance in finding like how to plan for even where it’s headed in the future?

Erica Ocampo (35:02)

The good thing about being with a company that is science driven is that data, we have a platform that has every single data point we have collected of these environmental research program. Data management and understanding all our impacts are just embedded within what we do. I think we’re already overdoing it. The data point is space.

I think most of the more difficult things to like the crystal ball is like, okay, the governance files, the governance teams, employee data, talking about, I don’t know, policies for the company, this kind of things, we have to set goals and ambitions. It’s not a crystal ball, perhaps it is more of a target. It forces us to set a target ahead of operations to know which direction we travel.

Wes Ashworth (35:51)

Yeah, I like that great, great perspective there. You touched again on governance. I know this, the governance debate is intense, right? Especially with the international sea bed authority process and TMC’s US permitting pathway without getting too lost in its legal detail. How do you personally think about the difference between what is legal? What’s what is legitimate and what earns trust?

Erica Ocampo (36:10)

The ISA, the International Seabed Authority process has taken over a decade without resolution. That’s quite disappointing. Knowing that the US did not ratify this treaty and develop through a robust process, something called the Deep Sea Bed Hard Minerals Resource Act, which predates this international treaty, makes me supported of a permitting pathway to the US.

I think trust needs to be earned. By actions, not words or legal arguments. I believe that the over 300 million and over a decade that TMC has invested in the last decade to research this specific area of NORI-D and develop the most robust environmental impact assessment provides a first step into earning this trust. The next will be starting with small operations, gathering more data and being transparent about what we find. This will hopefully continue to earn us trust and build the confidence to scale up operations.

Wes Ashworth (37:08)

I love that focus on trust. I think that distinction between permission and trust is huge. You know, in a legal pathway can answer one question, but asks something much deeper. To your point, you’re like building that trust, you know, onestep at a time.

One other thing you’ve shared with me, so you’ve talked about kind of feeling a little disappointed when people you thought were on the same sustainability team attacked imperfect solutions. We do see this in the industry. How has that changed the way you engage with NGOs, critics, and other sustainability professionals?

Erica Ocampo (37:37)

Yeah, at the end of the day, regardless of what we do professionally, we are all humans finding our place and happiness in this world. While in the sustainability professional world, we might share a similar vision when we do it on broad strokes, we can disagree on the pathways. That reminds me of this book written by Jonathan Heideck called The Righteous Mind. Why good people are divided by politics and religion. It gave me a better perspective of, you know, of our individual human coding.

I decided, you know what, they don’t like my pragmatic approach. This was 10,15 years ago, right? They don’t like my pragmatic approach because my mind was focusing to, I have these big corporations. If I make this little impact, then it’s a huge impact downstream. But it wasn’t cool enough. It wasn’t attractive enough. At the time we were doing this very lofty narrative goals. But then I continue doing that. I see that that pragmatism is now coming back to the sustainability world.

I now understand that, you know, even if we disagree on the path on the ways to arrive to that vision, I have to follow what I know what to do. I need for me it’s important to bring people together. Instead of making myself righteous, I try to understand the other side that might not be as ready as I am to move faster. I pushed them along because we only gonna solve this problem if we bring more people together.

Wes Ashworth (39:08)

I agree. If I had to bottle up, you know, what the industry needs to just propel and continue to move forward at a great pace, it’s that, you know. I think sometimes like the emotional side of sustainability leadership doesn’t get talked about enough. I think we are all very human. Focusing on are we making improvements? Are we getting better versus these, you sometimes it’s just this, people get so set on one idea or one solution or one pathway. You know, kudos to you, I think it takes a lot of resilience to keep engaging when criticism comes from multiple directions and then having humility to just kind of meet them where they are and not be this like, I’m you know I’m right you know type of thing. But to be able to communicate that clearly I think is more and more what’s needed.

Throughout here we’ve covered difficult terrain, minerals demand, recycling limits, ocean impact, social trade-offs, governance, trust and realities of building something new under scrutiny. I want to close by looking forward because one of the strongest themes from us and having previous conversations where you are seeing that pragmatism return to sustainability and I am as well too and I love to see that and I think that that again is more of the path that we need. As you shared there too, you’re starting to see that come back into sustainability. What is healthy pragmatism really look like and how is it different from compromise that gives away too much?

Erica Ocampo (40:20)

To me, pragmatism means staying in line with your values while acknowledging real world trade-offs. This real world trade-offs include other people’s values. For example, I love animals and I used to eat meat. That was a dissonance. It was a strong enough value that I decided that that dissonance was too unachievable for me to maintain and I decided to become vegetarian. Is this the solution for every single human? It is not. A

lso pragmatisms will indicate that if I want nobody to eat meat, everybody becomes vegetarian today, right? I’m making it a law. That’s not really being pragmatic, right? That’s me imposing my values into somebody else. I learned that pragmatism is not about my values, your values. It’s not about utopia. It’s not perfection. It’s not cynicism. It is simply progress.

Wes Ashworth (41:23)

Yeah, I love that. I think so much wisdom in how you phrase that. Again, I think could do the industry a lot of good if everybody starts buying into that a little bit more and listening to that. I’d love that you shared that such a great point there and a great takeaway.

We’ll think about this. When the next generation of engineers, sustainability leaders and energy transition builders’ kind of look back at this moment. What do you hope they say we got right about minerals, oceans and just the broader energy transition?

Erica Ocampo (41:50)

I am so excited about this next generation, right? Because we’re opening these new industries and new frontiers and new technology. As an engineer, can just think how fun that will be, like to decide what I can do next, being this new techno platform in the world. I hope they say we were honest about trade-offs, that we accelerated the energy transition while protecting people and planet. That we stay open to better solutions.

Wes Ashworth (42:20)

Yeah, I love that. You know, very, very hopeful place there. This really is, you know, generational work. I think the decisions being made now will shape both the infrastructure and the values of the energy transition. I’ve had a lot of leaders in the space kind of say like, you know, I’m a little jealous that that of the generation that’s coming into the industry now, like how exciting it’s going to be for the next 10, 20, 30 plus years into the future. I love that.

Final question, just an open one. Anything else you would like to share with the audience? Words of wisdom, anything else you didn’t get to share about the work TMC is doing? I’ll just give you the floor, anything you want to leave us with.

Erica Ocampo (42:56)

I will want to say to everybody that feeling discomfort is not bad, that having cognitive dissonance is human nature, but it is our responsibility to be aware of it, to stop, think about it, find the information and resolve it. That it is very easy to be against something, but it is so much more valuable and helpful to be pro something and work towards that. I have all my different moments where I haven’t felt as hopeful and that’s okay because then it just makes my beliefs stronger and my drive towards working for solutions better.

Wes Ashworth (43:36)

That’s so good. Such a hopeful note to end on. I will leave it right there. That is fantastic. But Erica, I thank you so much for joining Green Giants and for being willing to sit inside a conversation that it’s complex, contested and incredibly important. What I appreciate it most is you didn’t frame it as a perfect answer. You framed it as a real-world question. You know, how do we build the energy transition with eyes wide open about materials, ecosystems, communities, geopolitics and tradeoffs.

For everyone out there listening, this is exactly the kind of conversation we need more of, not slogans. not easy answers, better questions, better evidence, and more courage to engage with the uncomfortable parts of building the future. Thanks for listening to Green Giants Titans of Renewable Energy. If this episode challenged how you think about minerals, oceans, or the energy transition, please subscribe, leave a rating, and share it with someone who would value the conversation. With that, we will see you next week.