Canadian Mining Firm Seeks U.S. Permit to Bypass UN Seabed Rules

The Trump administration may be willing to help a Canadian company get a head start on seabed mining in the deep Pacific. Administration officials are in talks to use an obscure domestic law to bypass the International Seabed Authority and the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), granting a foreign firm a U.S. seabed lease in areas beyond national jurisdiction.

The Metals Company (TMC), a British Columbia-based mining firm with a strong ESG focus, has been trying to obtain an ISA permit to collect manganese nodules in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone for years. It had hoped to have ISA approvals in hand for a 2027 start, with support from the island nation of Nauru, but its push for the agency to craft regulations has recently been slowed down. Under the leadership of newly-elected ISA Secretary-General Leticia Carvalho, the agency has taken a deliberate pace towards passing final rules, and more than 30 nations, including the UK, France, Switzerland, Sweden and Denmark, want the industry to pause indefinitely until there is better science on its impact.

The CCZ is little-studied, and oceanographers warn that removing manganese nodules could do lasting damage to the ecosystem before it is even understood. Research financed by TMC found that the nodules may be a previously-undiscovered source of dissolved oxygen at the bottom, a revolutionary discovery.

TMC's CEO and chairman, Australian national Gerard Barron, has criticized ISA's slow movement on crafting final regulations. In a statement Thursday, he said that the company might simply bypass the ISA and obtain a license from a single nation - the United States.

“We believe we have sufficient knowledge to get started and prove we can manage environmental risks. What we need is a regulator with a robust regulatory regime, and who is willing to give our application a fair hearing. That’s why we’ve formally initiated the process of applying for licenses and permits under the existing U.S. seabed mining code," said Barron in a statement.

The U.S. code in question is the Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Act (DSHMRA), a little-known law passed in 1980 that created a domestic licensing mechanism for seabed mining. It serves as a substitute for the provisions of UNCLOS, which the U.S. has not ratified.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) told the New York Times that an approval process for TMC's permit request could begin soon, to include interagency consultations and public comment periods. To secure approval under the statute, TMC would have to use a U.S.-flagged vessel for the mining operation. Its contracted mining support ship, the drillship conversion Hidden Gem, is currently owned in India, managed in the Netherlands and flagged in Malta.

The company's proposal has attracted international opposition. On Friday, ISA Secretary-General Leticia Carvalho emphasized "that the authority holds exclusive jurisdiction over all activities in the international seabed area, which is recognized as the common heritage of humankind under UNCLOS."

More than three dozen nations, including China, Russia, the UK, France and India, have condemned TMC's plan and registered their support for the ISA. If the U.S. decides to support TMC and bypass UNCLOS, other nations could follow suit without constraints.

TMC faces the financial pressures familiar to any startup. It has lost about $70-80 million annually for the last two years, has no revenue, and has expended $630 million to date. In its 2024 earning statement, it projected that it has the financial resources to cover another 12 months of obligations, with $25 million in loan support from Barron and from board member Andrei Karkar.