Below the Surface of Deep Sea Mining Regulations
Deep sea mining has presented a unique challenge to international and regional governing authorities over the last few years. Murky property rights and environmental regulations have both slowed down the codification of deep sea mining rules for the International Seabed Authority (“ISA”). Established by the UN to regulate the sea, they are now facing a massive challenge with high pressure to act quickly. Recent discovery of oxygen-producing nodules in the Pacific sea bed has accelerated the demand for more guidelines. These nodules are a positive sign for miners, as they indicate the existence of many rare metals. The development of deep sea mining technology, along with the discovery of nodules bring this field into the realm of potential realistic profitability. While mining companies are increasingly ready to dive right in, the fact that many regulations are still being decided is a helpful hold on their enthusiasm.
While the roll-out of these regulations has taken many years, ISA’s unique challenge more than justifies their meticulousness and caution. The ISA must simultaneously reconcile the regulations of every country on earth with ownership of even a slice of sea. To refuse to do so would undermine their national authority, and most likely cause anger against the UN. If the ISA cannot successfully reconcile all these regulations into one standard set of rules, they would be discarding their own credibility while also leaving the ocean unprotected from miners in countries that choose not to participate in the ISA’s agreement. Private companies will only be able to access the seabed through a state entity that has requested ISA for permission. However, a precondition of this type of request is that a state has effective control over a firm. The determination of what effective control means has no clean answer, and ISA would have to devote much energy to this, particularly in developing countries.
Environmental concerns have rightfully taken up a massive portion of ISA’s legislative energy. They have a procedure in progress in which a potential “exploitant” would present an environmental impact study before they would be allowed to begin work. This practice is fairly standard, but it becomes difficult as some countries have far more stringent environmental standards than others. Distance becomes an almost irrelevant factor, as currents allow environmental effects to damage areas far beyond their “owner” country’s jurisdiction or even continent. Land-based concerns allow more heterogeneity of regulation, as the environmental effects of policy primarily only cause global problems when the skies are polluted. The full environmental risk of deep sea mining is still up for debate. Norway voted in favor of deep sea mining in 2024. As a more environmentally aware country, they still feel that the benefits of deep sea mining outweigh the costs. However, many scientists and policy experts do not feel the same. 800 of the signed a statement saying deep sea mining would create a “loss of biodiversity and ecosystem functioning that would be irreversible on multi-generational timescales.”
The latest meeting of ISA dealt with the difficulty of regulating cultural heritage concerns while also being open to poorer countries with a stronger drive to mine. The current regulation in progress states that work must stop for 24 hours upon the discovery “of any human remains of an archaeological or historical nature, or any object or site of a similar nature.” The rule also states that ISA must be notified before work can continue. The rule as it currently stands may be too ambiguous for miners to effectively work. The fear of breaking such a rule may lead some miners to pause mining frequently, even when they discover something almost certain not to be of archaeological significance. However, the spirit of the rule must remain in place, perhaps with more clear guidelines. Discoveries of Atlantis or Roman ships on the seabed should not be destroyed blindly in the name of commerce. Another problem with the lack of clarity is that the most effective miners in developed countries will be at the highest risk of ceasing mining too frequently for fear of regulation, while less effective miners with less technological ability to avoid pollution will be the least likely to fear the regulations, as their institutional environment will not prioritize concerns about the ecosystem.
ISA has taken on a truly titanic task, and is still working to hone the best coagulation of countless national interests. If they fail, they could cause both environmental disaster and heightened international tensions. If they succeed, innovation with greater quantities of these metals could take off and simultaneously increase environmental awareness of the seabed.
