Future Ethics of Pacific Deep-Sea Exploration
Futures of ethics and governance in Pacific deep-sea exploration.
Year
2025
Role
Service Design
Client
National Oceanography Centre (NOC) and New Economic Models for the Ocean (NEMO)
/ Background
This project was developed as part of a design sprint responding to briefs from the National Oceanography Centre (NOC) and New Economic Models for the Ocean (NEMO), aligned with the RCA’s UN Ocean Decade commitment to protect and restore marine ecosystems and biodiversity. Our team explored emerging futures of ethics and governance in Pacific deep-sea exploration, drawing on NOC’s marine research and NEMO’s work on ethical ocean economies.
We focused on the Clarion Clipperton Zone (CCZ), a vast area between Hawaii and Mexico spanning 4.5 million square kilometres. The CCZ contains abundant polymetallic nodules, which has attracted growing interest in deep-sea mining. At the same time, it is home to fragile, poorly understood ecosystems. This tension has placed the region at the centre of global debates on ocean governance, sustainability, and the ethics of deep-sea resource extraction.
/ Process
We used strategic foresight tools to guide the project, starting with signal scanning and Causal Layered Analysis to uncover root causes and hidden assumptions. The Futures Triangle helped us map past, present, and future forces, leading to four future scenarios that shaped our design.
From these, we created an ethical decision-making tool based on the ethical matrix, enhanced with stakeholder-specific prompts. Teams use YES/NO sliders to surface ethical tensions and spark meaningful discussion around decisions in both current and future contexts.
/ Future Scenarios
We developed four future scenarios mapped along two axes: the X-axis represents demand for deep-sea mining resources, while the Y-axis spans from environmental priorities to human-centered priorities. Each scenario was illustrated with an applied ethical matrix. Our work was showcased during the exhibition day, where NOC and NEMO scientists engaged with and discussed our findings. Among the five briefs, our team’s project was awarded first place.
Future Ethics of Pacific Deep-Sea Exploration
Futures of ethics and governance in Pacific deep-sea exploration.
Year
2025
Role
Service Design
Client
National Oceanography Centre (NOC) and New Economic Models for the Ocean (NEMO)
/ Background
This project was developed as part of a design sprint responding to briefs from the National Oceanography Centre (NOC) and New Economic Models for the Ocean (NEMO), aligned with the RCA’s UN Ocean Decade commitment to protect and restore marine ecosystems and biodiversity. Our team explored emerging futures of ethics and governance in Pacific deep-sea exploration, drawing on NOC’s marine research and NEMO’s work on ethical ocean economies.
We focused on the Clarion Clipperton Zone (CCZ), a vast area between Hawaii and Mexico spanning 4.5 million square kilometres. The CCZ contains abundant polymetallic nodules, which has attracted growing interest in deep-sea mining. At the same time, it is home to fragile, poorly understood ecosystems. This tension has placed the region at the centre of global debates on ocean governance, sustainability, and the ethics of deep-sea resource extraction.
/ Process
We used strategic foresight tools to guide the project, starting with signal scanning and Causal Layered Analysis to uncover root causes and hidden assumptions. The Futures Triangle helped us map past, present, and future forces, leading to four future scenarios that shaped our design.
From these, we created an ethical decision-making tool based on the ethical matrix, enhanced with stakeholder-specific prompts. Teams use YES/NO sliders to surface ethical tensions and spark meaningful discussion around decisions in both current and future contexts.
/ Future Scenarios
We developed four future scenarios mapped along two axes: the X-axis represents demand for deep-sea mining resources, while the Y-axis spans from environmental priorities to human-centered priorities. Each scenario was illustrated with an applied ethical matrix. Our work was showcased during the exhibition day, where NOC and NEMO scientists engaged with and discussed our findings. Among the five briefs, our team’s project was awarded first place.
Future Ethics of Pacific Deep-Sea Exploration
Futures of ethics and governance in Pacific deep-sea exploration.
Year
2025
Role
Service Design
Client
National Oceanography Centre (NOC) and New Economic Models for the Ocean (NEMO)
/ Background
This project was developed as part of a design sprint responding to briefs from the National Oceanography Centre (NOC) and New Economic Models for the Ocean (NEMO), aligned with the RCA’s UN Ocean Decade commitment to protect and restore marine ecosystems and biodiversity. Our team explored emerging futures of ethics and governance in Pacific deep-sea exploration, drawing on NOC’s marine research and NEMO’s work on ethical ocean economies.
We focused on the Clarion Clipperton Zone (CCZ), a vast area between Hawaii and Mexico spanning 4.5 million square kilometres. The CCZ contains abundant polymetallic nodules, which has attracted growing interest in deep-sea mining. At the same time, it is home to fragile, poorly understood ecosystems. This tension has placed the region at the centre of global debates on ocean governance, sustainability, and the ethics of deep-sea resource extraction.
/ Process
We used strategic foresight tools to guide the project, starting with signal scanning and Causal Layered Analysis to uncover root causes and hidden assumptions. The Futures Triangle helped us map past, present, and future forces, leading to four future scenarios that shaped our design.
From these, we created an ethical decision-making tool based on the ethical matrix, enhanced with stakeholder-specific prompts. Teams use YES/NO sliders to surface ethical tensions and spark meaningful discussion around decisions in both current and future contexts.
/ Future Scenarios
We developed four future scenarios mapped along two axes: the X-axis represents demand for deep-sea mining resources, while the Y-axis spans from environmental priorities to human-centered priorities. Each scenario was illustrated with an applied ethical matrix. Our work was showcased during the exhibition day, where NOC and NEMO scientists engaged with and discussed our findings. Among the five briefs, our team’s project was awarded first place.