The UN Is Trying To Block America From Mining the Seabed

Sitting at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean are enormous deposits of critical metals. Unlocking them could help free the United States and its allies from dependence on Chinese-controlled supply chains.  

Yet right now, inside a conference room in Kingston, Jamaica, United Nations (UN) bureaucrats at the International Seabed Authority (ISA) are working to prevent that. They want to stop the United States from doing something entirely lawful: mining the vast mineral wealth that lies on the ocean floor in the high seas.

Their goal is simple: prevent America from accessing the resources it needs to break China’s grip on the global supply chain for critical minerals.  

For years, China has dominated the supply of nickel, cobalt, manganese, and other metals essential for modern technology, advanced manufacturing, and national defense. These minerals are indispensable to everything from batteries and electric grids to military systems and industrial infrastructure.

The prospect of U.S. companies mining those minerals for themselves has triggered a remarkable backlash—not from Beijing alone, but from environmental activists, European governments, and international bureaucrats determined to maintain control over seabed mining through the United Nations system.

Their weapon of choice is not diplomacy or legislation. It is lawfare.

The Lawfare Campaign Against Seabed Mining

Activists and governments fully opposed to seabed mining have recently begun invoking provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)—specifically Articles 137 and 139—to argue that U.S. companies moving to engage in seabed mining could face international legal liability.

This claim is designed to scare away investors and choke off capital for an emerging American industry.

But it collapses under basic legal scrutiny.  

The United States never ratified UNCLOS. The U.S. Senate has refused to ratify UNCLOS for decades and has objected to the treaty’s seabed mining regime from the beginning. As a result, the United States is not bound by its seabed provisions or its regulatory institutions.  

Simply put, America cannot violate obligations it never accepted.  

Instead, the United States has always treated mining the seabed as a traditional high-seas freedom, a principle that long predates UNCLOS and remains firmly rooted in customary international law.  

America Already Has Its Own Seabed Mining Law  

The United States established a domestic regulatory framework for seabed mining more than four decades ago. In 1980, Congress passed the Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Act (DSHMRA) to create a licensing system for exploration and commercial recovery of seabed minerals.  

Under this system, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) administers permits and licenses through a transparent regulatory process with defined procedures and timelines.  

Recent regulatory updates have reinforced that the American system is active, predictable, and capable of supporting responsible commercial development.  

And investors are noticing.

In just the months since President Donald Trump issued an executive order supporting seabed mining, applications to NOAA have exceeded those made to the ISA in almost three decades in terms of total area of seafloor.

The United Nations’ Paralysis Problem  

Meanwhile, the UN’s own seabed regulator—the ISA—has failed for more than a decade to finalize rules for seabed mining.  

Indeed, many ISA member states—primarily our European “allies”—have called for delays and full-on moratoriums on seabed mining.  

The result has been paralysis. Contractors and sponsoring states exist in a regulatory limbo.  

A system originally intended to encourage seabed mining has been repurposed by environmental NGOs and UN bureaucrats to prevent it.  

Ironically, this political gridlock has also slowed the very scientific research many critics claim to support. When the regulatory future of the industry is uncertain, companies hesitate to invest heavily in exploration and environmental studies.  

Why China Benefits from Delays in Seabed Mining

The geopolitical implications are impossible to ignore.  

Every year that seabed mining is delayed is another year China retains dominance over critical mineral supply chains.  

China already controls much of the world’s processing capacity for nickel, cobalt, and rare earth minerals. It has invested heavily in seabed mining technology and has been awarded multiple contracts by the ISA.  

The longer the UN succeeds in paralyzing seabed mining, the more Beijing will benefit.  

The Real Choice Ahead on Seabed Mining

The debate over seabed mining is not simply about ocean resources.  

It is about whether the United States will allow an unelected international authority—and a coalition of activist governments and radical environmentalists—to determine whether Americans can access seabed resources.  

The answer should be clear.  

Media outrage does not create jurisdiction. Creative reinterpretations of treaties do not bind nations that never signed them. And legal intimidation cannot override sovereign rights.  

Deep-seabed mineral development authorized under U.S. law is lawful, legitimate, and necessary.  

If the United Nations cannot move forward, America should.  

And the sooner it does, the sooner the United States can begin breaking China’s grip on the critical minerals that power the modern world.  

Steven Groves works to protect and preserve American sovereignty, self-governance, and independence.

Reprinted with permission from The Heritage Foundation by Steven Groves.

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of AMAC or AMAC Action.