Britain is planning to claim vast areas of seabed in Antarctica. Photograph: CorbisThe United Kingdom is planning to claim sovereign rights over a vast area of the remote seabed off Antarctica, the Guardian has learned. The submission to the United Nations covers more than 1m sq km (386,000 sq miles) of seabed, and is likely to signal a quickening of the race for territory around the south pole in the world's least explored continent.
The claim would be in defiance of the spirit of the 1959 Antarctic treaty, to which the UK is a signatory. It specifically states that no new claims shall be asserted on the continent. The treaty was drawn up to prevent territorial disputes.
The Foreign Office, however, has told the Guardian that data is being gathered and processed for a submission to the UN which could extend British oil, gas and mineral exploitation rights up to 350 miles offshore into the Southern Ocean.
Much of the seabed there is at such a depth that extraction of gas, oil or minerals is not yet technically feasible, but the claim may still anger neighbouring South American countries who believe they have more entitlement to the potentially valuable territory.
The Antarctic submission reflects the UK's efforts to secure resources for the future as oil and natural gas reserves dwindle over the coming decades.
Last month the Guardian revealed the UK is working on three other sub-sea claims in the Atlantic: around South Georgia and the Falkland Islands, surrounding Ascension Island and in the Hatton/Rockall basin, west of Scotland. Britain has already lodged a joint claim at the UN - with France, Ireland and Spain - for a large area of seabed in the Bay of Biscay.
The Foreign Office confirmed yesterday that the UK was working to extend sovereign territory into new areas. "There are five claims in total that the UK is hoping to put forward," a statement said. "They are in the Bay of Biscay, around Ascension, off the British Antarctic Territory, around the Falkland Islands and South Georgia and in the Hatton/Rockall basin.
"We believe these five meet the geological conditions required. The claims are based on article 76 of the UN convention of the law of the sea."
Karen Sack, head of oceans for Greenpeace International, said little was known about the environmental impact on marine life of drilling and exploration at great depths. "What we don't know is what kind of impact these [prospecting] activities are having right now. We have more maps of the moon than we do of the deep sea. Whenever there's deep-sea fishing there's always new species identified. We would hope [states] would leave the [Antarctic] wilderness as it is."
The British Antarctic Territory, first claimed in 1908, forms a triangular wedge, with its apex at the south pole. It covers 666,000 sq miles and has two permanently-manned scientific stations. It is due to celebrate its centenary next year by issuing its first ever legal tender coin.
A British submersible recently dived to depths of more than two miles in the waters around the edge of the continental shelf. The seas are swarming with krill, shrimp-like crustaceans, brittle stars - which are similar to starfish - and sea cucumbers.
International interest in exploiting the new frontier on the oceans' floors comes as global warming is opening up previously frozen seas at the icecaps and the world's major economies are competing for fresh energy sources. During the summer Russia was subject to criticism for making claims beneath the Arctic Ocean, while France registered a claim to thousands of square miles around New Caledonia, in the Pacific.
The UK claim on Antarctica will be its most controversial because it depends on proximity to the British Antarctic Territory which overlaps rival land claims by Chile and Argentina. The environmental protocol to the Antarctic treaty, agreed in 1991, currently prohibits all mineral related activity, other than for scientific research.
Ministers will have to decide under what terms the application to the UN would be made. One possibility might be for the UK government to lodge a legal claim with the UN's commission on the limits of the continental shelf and effectively park it for consideration at a future date. The UN process allows states to extend their territorial rights over the ocean floor on an adjacent continental shelf up to 350 miles from shore. These applications may be limited by rival claims from neighbouring states. Submitting countries must demonstrate, with detailed geological and depth soundings, precisely the outer limits of the shelf.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2007/oct/17/antarctica.sciencenews
