{"id":334806,"date":"2025-04-29T17:23:04","date_gmt":"2025-04-29T11:53:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/?p=334806"},"modified":"2025-05-01T14:00:02","modified_gmt":"2025-05-01T08:30:02","slug":"continental-self","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/continental-self\/","title":{"rendered":"Continental Self"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>News:<\/strong> India raises continental-shelf claim in Arabian Sea region by nearly 10,000 square km.<\/p>\n<h2>About Continental Shelf<\/h2>\n<p>The ocean floors can be divided into <strong>four major divisions<\/strong>: (i) <strong>Continental Shelf<\/strong>; (ii) Continental Slope; (iii) Deep Sea Plain; (iv) Oceanic Deeps. Besides, these divisions there are also major and minor relief features in the ocean floors like <strong>ridges, hills, sea mounts, guyots, trenches, canyons<\/strong>, etc.<\/p>\n<h2>Continental Shelf<\/h2>\n<figure id=\"attachment_334811\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-334811\" style=\"width: 414px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-334811\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/continental-shelf.png?resize=414%2C163&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"414\" height=\"163\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/continental-shelf.png?resize=300%2C118&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/continental-shelf.png?w=358&amp;ssl=1 358w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 414px) 100vw, 414px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-334811\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Source &#8211; Wikipedia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<ul>\n<li>It is the <strong>extended margin of each continent<\/strong> occupied by relatively <strong>shallow seas and gulfs<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>It is the <strong>shallowest<\/strong> part of the ocean showing an average <strong>gradient of 1\u00b0 or even less<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Shelf break:<\/strong> The shelf typically ends at a very steep slope, called the <strong>shelf break.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Continental slope: <\/strong>From the break, the shelf descends toward the deep ocean floor in what is called the continental slope.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Width:<\/strong> The <strong>width<\/strong> of the continental shelves <strong>varies from one ocean to another<\/strong>. The average width of continental shelves is about 80 km.\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Narrow shelves:<\/strong> The shelves are <strong>almost absent or very narrow<\/strong> along some of the margins like the coasts of Chile, the west coast of Sumatra, etc.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Wide shelves:<\/strong> On the contrary, the Siberian shelf in the Arctic Ocean, the largest in the world, stretches to 1,500 km in width.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Depth:<\/strong> The depth of the shelves also varies. It may be as shallow as 30 m in some areas while in some areas it is as deep as 600 m.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Sediment deposition:<\/strong> They are covered with variable <strong>thicknesses of sediments brought down by rivers, glaciers, wind,<\/strong> from the land and distributed by waves and currents, becoming the <strong>source of fossil fuels.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Legal aspects<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>UNCLOS definition<\/strong>: Under the <strong>United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS<\/strong>), the continental shelf is the <strong>seabed and subsoil extending up to 200 nautical miles from<\/strong> a coastal <strong>state&#8217;s baseline<\/strong> or further if the natural margin extends beyond this limit.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Sovereign rights:<\/strong> Coastal nations have <strong>exclusive rights to explore and exploit resources<\/strong> on their continental shelf.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Extended Continental Shelf (ECS):<\/strong> Countries can <strong>claim beyond 200 nautical miles<\/strong> if they can prove the natural prolongation of their landmass, as India has done in the Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>News: India raises continental-shelf claim in Arabian Sea region by nearly 10,000 square km. About Continental Shelf The ocean floors can be divided into four major divisions: (i) Continental Shelf; (ii) Continental Slope; (iii) Deep Sea Plain; (iv) Oceanic Deeps. Besides, these divisions there are also major and minor relief features in the ocean floors&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/continental-self\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Continental Self<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10393,"featured_media":334811,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1566,11209,12039],"tags":[11872],"class_list":["post-334806","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-factly-articles","category-geography-in-news","category-knolls","tag-9pm-daily-factly","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/continental-shelf.png?fit=358%2C141&ssl=1","views":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334806","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10393"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=334806"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334806\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/334811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=334806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=334806"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumias.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=334806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}