Deep-Sea Mining

🌱 What was planned? Despite largescale international and EU opposition, Norway’s parliament approved plans for commercial-scale deep-sea mining on its continental shelf in January 2024. Norway was the “first country in the world” to do so. The plan was to allow companies to apply to mine for minera

🌱 What has Norway decided? Norway has now become “the first country [in the world] to open its continental shelf up to deep-sea mining”. On 9 January 2024, the national parliament of Norway voted 80–20 in favor of permitting exploratory deep-sea mining on Norway’s continental shelf in the Norwegian

🌱 What was decided at the talks? The ISA is tasked with issuing rules that govern 54% of the world’s oceans. In July, it held a meeting in Jamaica to negotiate rules on deep-sea mining. At the meeting, Chile, Costa Rica, France, Vanuatu, Palau and several other countries called for a precautionary

🌱 What is the ISA’s mandate? The ISA was formed in 1982, under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, and it has a small rotating council of member states. The rotating council makes decisions on behalf of 167 countries, plus the EU. (Notably, the USA has never joined.) The ISA “regul

🌱 Is deep-sea mining necessary? The Norwegian government “argues that deep-sea mining is crucial for the world’s energy transition, as it could dramatically increase the supply of critical minerals needed for the shift toward electrification”. Yet, over 800 marine science and policy experts – as we

🌱 What mining is planned? The exploration and extraction of deep-sea minerals is currently focused on polymetallic manganese nodules, cobalt-rich ferromanganese crusts, and polymetallic sulphides. 🌱 What exploration is ongoing? The International Seabed Authority (ISA) has issued a total of 31 lic

🌱 When will licenses be given out? While seabed explorations are ongoing, deep-sea mining has not yet commenced. Companies have, however, been allowed to file permits and the International Seabed Authority (ISA) has been reviewing applications for the past year. After the new rules on deep-sea mini

🌱 Why is deep-sea mining significant? Deep-sea mining “could supply key metals for the energy transition”. It is estimated that the polymetallic nodule reserves found on the sea floor could be used to produced 280 million electric vehicles. 🌱 Do we understand its effects? Our knowledge of deep-se