Governments turn against deep-sea mining as EV boom drives demand for metals

AS battery makers scramble to procure cobalt, nickel and other metals to meet rising consumer demand for electric cars, governmental opposition to strip-mining the seabed for minerals is mounting.

The deep ocean contains the largest estimated deposits of minerals on the planet, potentially worth trillions of dollars. But in recent weeks, Chile, Fiji, Palau and other nations have called for a moratorium on ocean mining until there is a better understanding of the environmental consequences of destroying little-explored and unique deep-sea ecosystems that play an undetermined role in the global climate. French President Emmanuel Macron, meanwhile, expressed his opposition to seabed mining in June at the United Nations Ocean Conference in Lisbon, Portugal.

UN members states must “create the legal framework to stop high sea mining and to not allow new activities putting in danger these ecosystems”, he said on the sidelines of the conference on Jun 30.

The pronouncements are striking, observers say, because those nations are members of the International Seabed Authority (ISA), the UN-affiliated organisation created to regulate deep-sea mining. Three of the countries — Chile, Fiji and France — sit on the ISA Council, the organisation’s 36-nation policymaking body that is meeting for the next 2 weeks in Kingston, Jamaica, to negotiate regulations that could allow mining to begin as soon as 2024.

Matthew Gianni, a long-time ISA observer and a founder of the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition, said in an e-mail that he expects other nations to join the call for a moratorium. “Countries are finally recognising the concerns expressed by scientists regarding the likely damage to the environment, fisheries, migratory species, biodiversity and ecosystem services such as carbon sequestration if deep-sea mining is permitted to go forward,” said Gianni, whose Amsterdam-based alliance represents more than 100 environmental groups and other non-governmental organisations.

Pradeep Singh, an ocean governance scholar at the University of Bremen in Germany who studies the seabed authority, said the push for a moratorium by ISA member states “is a turning point in the negotiations” over deep-sea mining. “These calls for a pause or moratorium certainly do question the legitimacy” of seabed mining, he said in an e-mail.

Ambassador Gina Guillén Grillo, who serves as Costa Rica’s permanent representative to the ISA and a delegate to the Council, said: “My country has many concerns regarding the push for starting the mining phase so soon. There is basically no information on the flora, fauna and ecosystems in the deep sea and seabed.

“We have to remember that the seabed and its resources belong to humankind, so member states might also decide they don’t want to mine,” she added in an e-mail. “They might instead wish to explore the potentiality of the amazing biodiversity for fields such as medicine, space aeronautics, cosmetics and fire resistance.”

Google and automakers BMW, Renault, Volkswagen and Volvo have pledged not to use deep-sea metals for the time being, and 623 marine scientists and policy experts have signed a petition advocating a pause in seabed mining.

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The ISA did not respond to a request for comment on the calls for a moratorium.

The UN Convention on the Law of the Sea treaty established the ISA in 1994 to regulate deep-sea mining in international waters for the “benefit of mankind as a whole”, while ensuring “effective protection of the marine environment”.

“This obligation is absolute, we cannot disregard it,” said Guillén Grillo. “We need time, resources for marine scientific research and for the whole international community to become involved.”

The ISA consists of 167 member states and the European Union. The US is not an ISA member, as it has not ratified the treaty, but participates in the organisation’s proceedings as an observer. 

Since 2001, the ISA has issued exploration contracts to state-backed enterprises, government agencies and private companies to prospect for minerals over more than 1.29 million sq km of the seabed in the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific oceans. Still, ISA has yet to approve mining regulations. Once it does, those contractors can apply for an exploitation licence to start mining. Each mining contractor must be sponsored by an ISA member nation and pay it and the ISA royalties on the minerals mined. 

Mining contractors have argued that deep-sea mining will have less of an environmental impact than terrestrial mining and is necessary to provide the metals needed for a transition to a fossil fuel-free future.

The ISA Council had spent years working on mining regulations when in June 2021, Nauru, a small Pacific island nation, upended negotiations by triggering a clause in the Law of the Sea treaty that requires the seabed authority to approve mining regulations within 2 years.

Nauru is the sponsor of a subsidiary of The Metals Company, a Canadian-registered mining venture. If the ISA does not approve regulations by July 2023, it may be compelled to provisionally issue a mining licence to The Metals Company under whatever environmental protections for the seabed are in place at the time. BLOOMBERG