Deep Sea Mining

https://time.com/

Deep-seafloor mining is a complex topic that leaves out a crucial starting point: mining the potato-sized rocks on the seafloor called “nodules” only yields four metals of any economic consequence: nickel, cobalt, copper, and manganese. Since copper and manganese are plentiful on land, deep-seafloor mining is really all about nickel and cobalt. And, unlike many have tried to claim, you cannot in fact get meaningful amounts of rare earth elements from the seafloor.

In the early 2020s, deep-seafloor mining was advertised as a source of key metals for electric vehicle (EV) batteries. However, battery technology has moved dramatically forward with new chemistries that require no cobalt or nickel and instead use inexpensive iron, phosphorus, and sodium.

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https://thediplomat.com/

The White House’s executive order last month purports to authorize mining in international waters – against the authority of a U.N. regulatory body.

In recent years, deep-sea mining has emerged as a polarizing issue in the Pacific Islands, and the nascent industry is not yet regulated. Now the region is contending with another challenge: the potential breakdown of international rules that might be the marine environment’s last defense.

The Pacific seabed is estimated to hold billions of dollars worth of manganese, cobalt, copper, and nickel, which are used to make smartphones, batteries for electric vehicles, and solar panels, and which are also crucial to the defense and aerospace industries.

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The still potential-but-perhaps-soon-to-be-real world of seabed mining took an interesting turn in the past month.

The still potential-but-perhaps-soon-to-be-real world of seabed mining took an interesting turn in the past month. The announcement from The Metals Company that it “has formally initiated a process…to apply for exploration licenses and commercial recovery permits under existing U.S. legislation, the Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Act of 1980 (DSHMRA)” came just prior to the White House’s issuance of a new executive order authorizing this approach.

These announcements mark major course changes. The Metals Company is essentially giving up on the existing international framework to govern and regulate seabed mining in areas beyond national jurisdiction (the high seas), and the U.S., which to date has been a largely passive observer of efforts to develop seabed mining, may be about to thrust itself into the center of the action.

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https://www.reuters.com/

President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order aimed at boosting the deep-sea mining industry, the latest attempt to boost US production of nickel, copper and other critical minerals used widely across the economy.

The broad order avoids a direct confrontation with the United Nations-backed International Seabed Authority and seeks essentially to jumpstart the mining of US waters as part of a push to offset China’s sweeping control of the critical minerals industry.

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https://www.reuters.com/

The White House is weighing an executive order that would fast-track permitting for deep-sea mining in international waters and let mining companies bypass a United Nations-backed review process, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the deliberations.

If signed, the order would mark U.S. President Donald Trump’s latest attempt to tap international deposits of nickel, copper and other critical minerals used widely across the economy after recent efforts in Greenland and Ukraine. Trump earlier this month also invoked emergency powers to boost domestic minerals production.

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https://www.nytimes.com/

Diplomats from more than 30 nations have criticized a proposal that could allow the start of seabed mining by 2027.

Nearly 40 nations, big and small, have voiced opposition to a plan by a Wall Street-backed mining company to team up with the Trump administration to circumvent international law and start seabed mining in the Pacific Ocean with a U.S. permit.

The widespread furor reflected a rare alignment from countries as varied as China, Russia, India, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Indonesia, France, Argentina, Uganda and the small island nations of Mauritius and Fiji. The plan also brought to the fore a pitched clash over who regulates seabed mining in international waters.

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https://www.msn.com/

The world’s oceans harbor a cultural heritage of sunken ships, remains of those lost in the transatlantic slave trade and Indigenous islanders’ spiritual ties to the sea that must be protected, NGOs and native peoples say.

They are pushing at a meeting in Jamaica of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) — an organization established under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea — for such protection to be enshrined in a mining code that is being negotiated to govern the exploitation of sea beds in international waters.

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https://www.france24.com/en/

Tokyo (AFP) – Rules on deep-sea mining in international waters must be driven by “sound science” and built on consensus, the head of the body charged with regulating the divisive practice said Thursday.

Deep-sea mining in international waters involves taking minerals like nickel, cobalt and copper — crucial for renewable energy technology — from the sea floor.

But researchers and environmentalists have long warned it risks destroying habitats and species that are little understood, and could upset delicate processes in the ocean that affect climate change.

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https://www.france24.com/en/

“It feels like a real crunch point,” Louisa Casson of Greenpeace International told AFP. “We are seeing surging momentum for a moratorium (on deep-sea mining). But at the same time, the industry is saying 2025 is the year when we’re just going to start applying to mine.”

Greenpeace has warned for years of the risks posed by deep-sea mining to the oceans’ unique, but only partly understood, ecosystems. Until recently, the idea of plunging deep into ocean abyss for the large-scale extraction of coveted minerals like cobalt, nickel and copper seemed a distant possibility.

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