Photo: SAUL LOEB
An ocean conservation non-profit has condemned the United States President's latest executive order aimed at boosting the deep sea mining industry.
President Donald Trump issued the "Unleashing America's offshore critical minerals and resources" order on Thursday, directing the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to allow permitting for deep sea mining.
The order states, "It is the policy of the US to advance United States leadership in seabed mineral development."
NOAA has been directed to, within 60 days, "expedite the process for reviewing and issuing seabed mineral exploration licenses and commercial recovery permits in areas beyond national jurisdiction under the Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Act."
Ocean Conservancy said the executive order is a result of deep sea mining frontrunner, The Metals Company, requesting US approval for mining in international waters, bypassing the authority of the International Seabed Authority (ISA).
The ISA is the United Nations agency responsible for coming up with a set of regulations for deep sea mining across the world. The US is not a member of the ISA because it has not ratified UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).
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"This executive order flies in the face of NOAA's mission," Ocean Conservancy's vice president for external affairs Jeff Watters said.
"NOAA is charged with protecting, not imperiling, the ocean and its economic benefits, including fishing and tourism; and scientists agree that deep-sea mining is a deeply dangerous endeavor for our ocean and all of us who depend on it," he said.
He said areas of the US seafloor where test mining took place over 50 years ago still had not fully recovered.
"The harm caused by deep sea mining isn't restricted to the ocean floor: it will impact the entire water column, top to bottom, and everyone and everything relying on it.
"Evidence tells us that areas targeted for deep-sea mining often overlap with important fisheries, raising serious concerns about the impacts on the country's $321 billion fishing industry."
He said the executive order would have far-reaching implications beyond the US.
"By unilaterally pursuing mining in international waters in defiance of the rest of the world, the [Trump] administration is opening a door for other countries to do the same - and all of us, and the ocean we all depend on, will be worse off for it."
Reuters reported that the order avoids a direct confrontation with the ISA and seeks to jumpstart the mining of US waters as part of a push to offset China's sweeping control of the critical minerals industry.
It reported that parts of the Pacific Ocean and elsewhere are estimated to contain large amounts of potato-shaped rocks, known as polymetallic nodules, which filled with the building blocks for electric vehicles and electronics.
According to a Trump administration official who spoke to the news agency, more than 1 billion metric tons of those nodules are estimated to be in US waters and filled with manganese, nickel, copper and other critical minerals.
Earlier this month, The Metals Company's chief executive wrote a scathing letter to the ISA, claiming that the agency was "being influenced by a faction of States allied with environmental NGOs who see the deep sea mining industry as their 'last green trophy'".
