Trump Order Fast Tracks Subsea Mining
President Donald Trump signed an executive order aimed at boosting the deep-sea mining industry, marking his latest attempt to boost U.S. access to nickel, copper and other critical minerals used widely across the economy.
Hundreds of Impossible Metals’ Eureka III collectors could be deployed concurrently.
Image courtesy of Impossible Metals
“The United States government has no right to unilaterally allow an industry to destroy the common heritage of humankind, and rip up the deep sea for the profit of a few corporations,” said Arlo Hemphill of Greenpeace, which opposes the practice.
Any country can allow deep-sea mining in its own territorial waters, roughly up to 200 nautical miles from shore, and companies are already lining up to mine U.S. waters.
Impossible Metals earlier this month asked the administration to launch a commercial auction for access to deposits of nickel, cobalt and other critical minerals off the coast of American Samoa.
Shares of The Metals Company – among the most prominent of deep-sea mining companies – rose on Thursday by roughly 40% to hit a 52-week high of $3.39 per share after the Reuters report earlier in the day on the executive order.
“With a stable, transparent, and enforceable regulatory pathway available under existing U.S. law, we look forward to delivering the world’s first commercial nodule project, responsibly and economically,” said Gerard Barron, CEO of the company, which aims to extract nodules from a vast plain of the Pacific Ocean between Hawaii and Mexico known as the Clarion-Clipperton Zone.
Beyond The Metals Company, others eyeing deep-sea mining include California-based Impossible Metals, Russia’s JSC Yuzhmorgeologiya, Blue Minerals Jamaica, China Minmetals, and Kiribati’s Marawa Research and Exploration.
U.S. access to critical minerals – especially those produced by Chinese companies – has dwindled in recent months as Beijing has limited exports of several types. That, in turn, has ratcheted up pressure on Washington to support efforts to boost domestic mining.
Last week, Trump officials fast-tracked permitting on 10 mining projects across the United States and implemented an abbreviated approval process for mining projects on federal lands.
The administration also said it would approve one of the country’s largest copper mines.
Trump’s Thursday order uses the term “rare earths” to broadly refer to all critical minerals and is not meant to imply the administration believes the nodules contain neodymium and the 16 other rare earths, the administration official said.
(Reporting by Jarrett Renshaw and Ernest Scheyder; Editing by Aidan Lewis and Daniel Wallis)
Send in the Machines! SMD developed the mining machinery planned for the Solwari 1 sulfides project.
Image courtesy of SMD
