- World leaders have renewed calls for a global moratorium on deep-sea mining at the 2025 U.N. Ocean Conference (UNOC) in Nice, France, as the U.S. moves to mine the deep sea in international waters under its own controversial authority.
- Four additional countries have joined the coalition of nations calling for a moratorium, precautionary pause, or ban on deep-sea mining, bringing the total number to 37.
- The U.S., which did not have an official delegation at UNOC, is pushing forward with its plans to mine in international waters — a decision that has drawn criticism from the international community.
This story was supported by the Pulitzer Center’s Ocean Reporting Network, where Elizabeth Claire Alberts is a fellow.
NICE, France — At the 2025 U.N. Ocean Conference (UNOC), taking place in Nice, France, between June 9 and 13, world leaders renewed their call for a global moratorium on deep-sea mining, an emerging industry that many experts say could seriously and irreversibly damage marine ecosystems.
At the opening plenary, French President Emmanuel Macron denounced deep-sea mining as “madness.” He described the prospective industry as a “predatory” activity that threatens to destroy the seabed and potentially release stored carbon. France was among the first countries to take a stand against deep-sea mining, calling for a ban in 2022.
U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres echoed Macron’s concerns, warning that the deep sea “cannot become the Wild West.” He also voiced strong support for the International Seabed Authority (ISA), the U.N.-affiliated body tasked with both regulating deep-sea mining in international waters and with protecting the seabed.
Since 2022, 33 countries have called for a precautionary pause, moratorium, or ban on deep-sea mining. That number has since risen to 37 with the addition of Slovenia, Latvia, Cyprus and the Marshall Islands.
“We cannot afford to miss the ocean’s capacity to absorb our carbon,” President Hilde Heine of the Marshall Islands told reporters in a press briefing on June 10. “A ban is the safest choice for nature [and] marine life.”
At UNOC, several countries that have already endorsed a moratorium or precautionary pause also reiterated their stance, including Brazil, Costa Rica and Palau.
These expressions of support follow the release by the Trump administration in the U.S. of an executive order on April 24, invoking an existing U.S. law, the Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Act (DSHMRA), to assert unilateral authority to mine in international waters — an area technically beyond the jurisdiction of any one country. This stance contrasts with the widely accepted international view that the ISA is the sole body authorized to regulate deep-sea mining in international waters.
On March 27, prior to the release of the executive order, Vancouver-based The Metals Company (TMC), which holds exploration licenses via the ISA, revealed that it would no longer apply for deep-sea mining licenses via the ISA. Instead, it would apply through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the U.S. regulator of deep-sea mining in international waters via DSHMRA. On April 29, the company announced that it had officially applied for a commercial recovery permit.
The U.S. did not appear to have an official delegation at the opening plenary session of the U.N. Ocean Conference on June 9. However, a U.S. State Department representative told Mongabay via email that two members of the “Presidential Environmental Advisory Task Force” were attending the conference as government observers. In January, Ed Russo, a businessman and Trump’s long-time environmental adviser, announced that he had formed this new task force to advise the president on environmental decisions.
A spokesperson for the U.S. State Department, who declined to provide a name, said UNOC’s focus of implementing the U.N.’s Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 14 — a goal devoted to conservation and sustainable use of the oceans — was at “odds with the U.S. position on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the SDGs.” The spokesperson added that the U.N. SDGs “advance a program of soft global governance that is inconsistent with U.S. sovereignty and adverse to the rights and interests of Americans” and that the U.S. “will no longer reaffirm them as a matter of course,” seeming to suggest that the U.S. would no longer be engaging with the goals of the U.N.
“Critical minerals are essential to the U.S. economy and to the technologies powering America’s economic growth, prosperity, and national security,” the State Department spokesperson told Mongabay in an email. “U.S. leadership in deep sea science, technology, and seabed mineral development is essential to building secure critical mineral supply chains.”
The spokesperson also said that Trump’s executive order would “establish the United States as a global leader in responsible seabed mineral exploration, technology, and practices, and as a partner for countries developing seabed mineral resources in areas within their national jurisdictions.”
President Surangel Whipps Jr. of Palau, who has been publicly calling for a moratorium on deep-sea mining since 2022, told Mongabay in a press briefing that the U.S. should not be able to “unilaterally decide” to mine the deep sea, and that the rules of the ISA should be respected.
“This is the common heritage of humankind,” he said in reference to international waters, where TMC is looking to mine.
Megan Randles of Greenpeace International, who is attending UNOC, told Mongabay in a written statement that “it is very clear that many States are alarmed by the reckless actions of the US administration and the deep sea mining industry to bypass international law.”
“The science is clear — deep sea mining would cause irreversible harm to the ocean,” Randles added. “A moratorium would protect the deep sea and uphold multilateralism and ensures that decisions that impact our shared ocean lies in the hands of all member states of the International Seabed Authority, together, for the benefit of all and future generations.”
Banner image: French President Emmanuel Macron speaks during the High-Level inaugural dinner of the UN Ocean Conference (UNOC). Image © Philémon Henry/MEAE.
France’s Macron joins growing chorus calling for deep-sea mining ban
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