The fall in the price of gold – down 40% since 2011- is forcing investors to re-think mining projects announced for Portugal, writes Diário de Notícas. Already the ambitious Jales project in Trás-os-Montes which promised an investment of €66 million is at a standstill, despite contracts drawn up in 2012 with the government. Secretary of State for Energy Artur Trindade blamed the situation on the collapse of gold prices.
As DN brings the news, scientists in Germany have sounded a global warning about hydrocarbon exploration, particularly when it takes place at sea.
Sabine Mathesius of the GEOMAR research project in Kiel claims drilling into the ocean bed has so altered the composition of the world’s waters that we could be looking at an “extinction catastrophe” for hundreds of marine species.
The problem centres on the amounts of carbon dioxide being released into the oceans as a result of fuel exploration.
According to Mathesius and her colleagues, the world’s oceans are now more acid than they have been for 300 million years.
