Ministry plans to acquire unmanned submersible to look for resources+

TOKYO, Sept. 4 Kyodo -
The land ministry plans to acquire an unmanned submersible to gather data for
use in searching for natural resources beneath the seabed in the country's
exclusive economic zone, ministry sources said Saturday.
The plan, for which the ministry intends to request 1.1 billion yen in the
budget for the fiscal year starting next April with a view to operating the
apparatus from fiscal 2012, indicates Japan's resolve to secure its maritime
interests.
To discover the existence of natural resources it is necessary to gather
detailed data on the undulation of the seabed and the configuration of a crust
beneath it.
The probes that have so far been conducted using equipment on Japan Coast Guard
survey ships are only capable of gathering precise data up to about 200 meters
below sea level.
The planned unmanned submersible would look like a rocket about 10 meters long
and can submerge to the depth of about 2.5 kilometers, the sources said. It
would be able to take a preprogrammed route and measure terrain from 50 meters
above the seabed using sonar.
The Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism Ministry plans to use the
submersible in deep waters deemed promising as an area with deposits of natural
resources, such as crude oil and natural gas, the sources added.
The exclusive economic zone is defined as an area within 200 nautical miles, or
about 370 km, from a country's coast.
Japan and China are locked in disputes over maritime interests, including gas
exploration in the East China Sea, where the exclusive economic zones claimed
by the two countries overlap.
China also argues that Okinotori Island, an uninhabited coral reef located
1,740 km south of Tokyo, is not an island but rocks, opposing Japan's
designation of an exclusive economic zone and a continental shelf around its
southernmost island.
==Kyodo
2010-09-04 23:14:59