Rocks are not usually of major popular interest. They are dull and boring and worthless in their abundance, so it seems. This article touches on an economic market related to rocks that, though it has been active for decades, people do not know much about: it is the trade of manganese nodules found on the ocean floor that contain commercially viable elements. But recently, these nodules have been found to have rare-earth minerals, elements that may add significantly to the rocks’ commercial value.
The writer, William J. Broad, sets up this article nicely. First he describes the manganese nodules, why there is a market for them, and that this market used to be relatively unprofitable. This leads up to the second paragraph: “Now, the frustrated visionaries [entrepreneurs] are talking excitedly about the possibility of belated success, and perhaps even profits.” With this turn, Broad gets the reader excited about the possibilities as well, engages them, and encourages to read on about the benefits of rare-earth minerals and what they can do for technology in the modern world (they’re useful for a host of 21st century technologies, from lasers to computer chips to LCD displays). After he writes that these nodules contain valuable rare-earths and that China, “which controls some 95 percent of the world’s supply, had blocked shipments, sounding political alarms around the globe and a rush for alternatives,” he dives into the quotes from scientists with a great one-line paragraph in the form of a question: “So are seabed miners smiling at last?” He waits until the middle of the article to fully explain the nature and applications of these minerals—which serves as an interesting spike for the reader as he/she reads. In a fast-paced, exciting article brimming with scientist quotes, Broad ends with one that looks to the future: Dr. Morgan of the Underwater Mining Institute said, “It’s getting more active…Industrial people are starting to look at it again.”
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