President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday aimed at boosting the deep-sea mining industry, focusing on increasing U.S. access to critical minerals such as nickel, copper, and others essential for industries like electric vehicles and electronics.
The order seeks to accelerate mining operations in both U.S. and international waters as part of a broader effort to reduce China’s dominance in the critical minerals sector.
Certain areas of the Pacific Ocean and other regions are believed to contain large amounts of polymetallic nodules, rich in manganese, nickel, copper, and other key minerals. U.S. waters alone are estimated to hold over 1 billion metric tons of these nodules. The extraction of these minerals could contribute $300 billion to the U.S. GDP over the next decade and create approximately 100,000 jobs, according to administration officials.
The executive order underscores the U.S.’s national security and economic interests in maintaining leadership in deep-sea science and seabed mineral resources. It directs the administration to expedite mining permits under the Deep Seabed Hard Minerals Resource Act of 1980 and to establish a permit process for the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf.
Additionally, the order calls for a more efficient review of seabed mining permits in international waters, a move that could spark tensions with the international community.
The International Seabed Authority, created by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (which the U.S. has not ratified), has been working on establishing standards for deep-sea mining in international waters. However, disagreements over environmental concerns such as noise and dust have delayed the finalization of these standards.
The move comes amid growing pressure to secure domestic sources of critical minerals as China limits exports of key materials. The Trump administration has also fast-tracked the approval process for several mining projects across the U.S., including one of the country’s largest copper mines.
