The hunt to recover the precious metals from the seabed has begun. German geologists recently carried out an extended research project in the Pacific. They wanted to find out how many manganese nodules there are, and where they are scattered. 24 million tons of precious metals are believed to be lying under the world’s oceans. The German geologists are trying to learn whether the nodules could be recovered from the seabed without damaging the environment, and which technology would be best suited to do that. We take a look at their findings.