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oceans
Inside the Shadowy Forum Trying (and Likely Failing) to Make Deep-Sea Mining Happen
The goal of an invitation-only event seemed to be to foster a shared belief among government officials and mining industry executives that deep-sea mining has a future. I’m not sure it worked.
Feb 06, 2026
In the chaotic aftermath of Snowmaggedon 2026, I snuck into the Offshore Critical Minerals Exploration and Development Forum at the famed Willard Hotel, known for hosting exclusive insider events and serving as a primary gathering spot for Washington DC’s “movers and shakers.” This event fit that mold—but with the growing secrecy of the deep-sea mining crowd added for extra flavor.
Hosted by the American Council for Capital Formation (ACCF), the goal of this invitation-only event seemed to be to foster a shared belief among government officials and mining industry executives that deep-sea mining has a future. I’m not sure it worked.
The Elephant Was Still in the Room
ACCF’s Michael Zehr set the tone early, making sure everyone understood that “we’re not here to discuss the ISA [International Seabed Authority] and UNCLOS [United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea].”
OK, look, I get it. I’m sure they had to promise that the agenda would steer clear of prickly issues of international law to get the Trump officials to show up. But it’s a bit delusional to assume that the US will just carry on with President Donald Trump’s plan to bypass the International Seabed Authority after Trump is gone, so avoiding this issue completely undermined the whole purpose of the gathering.
“This Is an Industry That Does Not Exist”
Not only does deep-sea mining not yet exist, as Ocean Minerals CEO Hans Smit pointed out, it is an industry that should not exist. Humanity does not have a very good track record when it comes to launching new extractive industries, as even the predictable consequences are often dwarfed by the impacts we didn’t fully see coming. But this was not the group of people who were going to pause for that kind of self-reflection.
Instead, the mining CEOs did their best to convince everyone that deep-sea mining is easy and definitely going to happen while simultaneously making excuses for why it might take a long time. The investors tried to politely raise some of their huge glaring concerns in a way that wouldn’t alarm the government officials. And the Trump administration officials waved away questions about whether future leaders are going to just pull the plug on Trump’s reckless approach. Throughout the day, speakers probably spent more time worrying about environmentalists than the environment, which I suppose was no surprise coming from this bunch.
“It Has Been Hard”
The speakers responsible for raising the capital to make DSM possible acknowledged that investors are not exactly jumping on this rusty bandwagon. Mining is right up there with tobacco, alcohol, pornography, and gambling for many investors, who categorically exclude financing industries that fail the vice clause screen. Even those who might be willing to overlook the environmental impacts or reputational risks have held back, apparently for two main reasons.
As someone who has worked closely with staff at NOAA, State, and other federal agencies for over 20 years, it was galling to see how completely captured these agencies have become by corporate interests.
First, deep-sea mining is fantastically expensive to get going, and so far no one is close to being ready to operate at commercial scale. No one wants to throw hundreds of millions of dollars into a venture that may well be headed for bankruptcy (again). Which is connected to the second big problem, which came up throughout the day: durability. This administration will be out of office well before commercial mining will be operational, and probably even before it can be permitted. Even Tim Petty, the assistant secretary of commerce, refused to speculate on whether the Trump administration could move fast enough to actually grant permits, looking visibly uncomfortable and just saying, “We’ll see.”
Sometimes, when they avoid the question, it is all the answer you need. Petty also ducked a question about the approach the administration will take to consultation with Pacific stakeholders, responding with a completely unrelated tangent. Then, when he was asked about a comment Rep. Ed Case (D-Hawaii) had just made at a congressional hearing, that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is in bed with The Metals Company, Petty preferred to recount that in his meeting with staffers, “None of the questions about the environment came up”—as if that was some sort of validation.
Open for Business
As someone who has worked closely with staff at NOAA, State, and other federal agencies for over 20 years, it was galling to see how completely captured these agencies have become by corporate interests. Don’t get me wrong, corporations have always had far too much influence over public policy, but hearing NOAA’s Deputy Assistant Secretary Erik Noble say repeatedly that “NOAA is open for business” does not exactly provide much assurance that the agency responsible for stewardship of our oceans is up to the task right now. The general message from NOAA and Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) officials to mining execs was clear: We are on your side. Regulations and laws are flexible, money will flow, incentives are coming. Tell us what you need and we will make it happen. To drive the point home even harder, Megan Carr used the gathering as an opportunity to announce that BOEM was launching a new process to start paving the way for deep-sea mining on Alaska’s outer continental shelf.
The Echo Chamber
It was painful to sit through a day of delusional boosterism, especially from agencies that are responsible for protecting our oceans and America’s standing in the world. By the second half of the day, though, it was clear that there were hardly any “investors” in the room, and that the audience was mostly just made up of a rotating group of speakers talking to each other. Two-thirds of the seats were empty, and so, ultimately, was the promise of any real discussion when fundamental issues were off the table, speakers were unwilling to answer questions (from moderators only—no questions were ever taken from the audience), and people with other perspectives were not invited.
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62,000 African Penguins Starving to Death Highlights Humanity-Driven Extinction Crisis
"If a species as iconic as the African penguin is struggling to survive," said one researcher, "it raises the question of how many other species are disappearing without us even noticing."
Dec 05, 2025
A study published this week about tens of thousands of starving African penguins is highlighting what scientists warn is the planet's sixth mass extinction event, driven by human activity, and efforts to save as many species as possible.
Researchers from the South African Department of Forestry, Fisheries, and the Environment (DFFE), the United Kingdom's University of Exeter, and other institutions examined a pair of breeding colonies north of Cape Town, South Africa, and published their findings Thursday in Ostrich: Journal of African Ornithology.
"These two sites are two of the most important breeding colonies historically—holding around 25,000 (Dassen) and around 9,000 (Robben) breeding pairs in the early 2000s. As such, they are also the locations of long-term monitoring programs," said study co-author Azwianewi Makhado from the DFFE in a statement.
As the study explains: "African Penguins moult annually, coming ashore and fasting for 21 days, when they shed and replace all their feathers. Failure to fatten sufficiently to moult, or to regain condition afterwards, results in death."
The team found that "between 2004 and 2011, the sardine stock off west South Africa was consistently below 25% of its peak abundance, and this appears to have caused severe food shortage for African penguins, leading to an estimated loss of about 62,000 breeding individuals," said co-author and Exeter associate professor Richard Sherley.
The paper notes that "although some adults moulted at a colony to the southeast, where food may have been more plentiful, much of the mortality likely resulted from failure of birds to fatten sufficiently to moult. The fishery exploitation rate of sardines west of Cape Agulhas was consistently above 20% between 2005 and 2010."
Sherley said that "high sardine exploitation rates—that briefly reached 80% in 2006—in a period when sardine was declining because of environmental changes likely worsened penguin mortality."
Humanity's reliance on fossil fuels is warming ocean water and impacting how salty it is. For the penguins' prey, said Sherley, "changes in the temperature and salinity of the spawning areas off the west and south coasts of South Africa made spawning in the historically important west coast spawning areas less successful, and spawning off the south coast more successful."
The researcher also stressed that "these declines are mirrored elsewhere," pointing out that the species' global population has dropped nearly 80% in the last three decades. With fewer than 10,000 breeding pairs left, the African penguin was uplisted to "critically endangered" on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species last year.
Sherley told Mongabay at the time that the IUCN update "highlights a much bigger problem with the health of our environment."
"Despite being well-known and studied, these penguins are still facing extinction, showing just how severe the damage to our ecosystems has become," he said. "If a species as iconic as the African penguin is struggling to survive, it raises the question of how many other species are disappearing without us even noticing. We need to act now—not just for penguins, but to protect the broader biodiversity that is crucial for the planet's future."
Looks like the combined effects of climate change and over fishing are key factors in decimating the populations of these penguins.www.washingtonpost.com/climate-envi...
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— Margot Hodson (@margothodson.bsky.social) December 5, 2025 at 4:46 AM
Fearful that the iconic penguin species could be extinct within a decade, the conservation organizations BirdLife South Africa and the Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds (SANCCOB) last year pursued a first-of-its-kind legal battle in the country, resulting in a settlement with the commercial fishing sector and DFFE.
The settlement, reached just days before a planned court hearing this past March, led to no-go zones for the commercial anchovy and sardine fishing vessels around six penguin breeding colonies: Stony Point, as well as Bird, Dassen, Dyer, Robben, and St. Croix islands.
"The threats facing the African penguin are complex and ongoing—and the order itself requires monitoring, enforcement, and continued cooperation from industry and the government processes which monitor and allocate sardine and anchovy populations for commercial purposes," Nicky Stander, head of conservation at SANCCOB, said in March.
The study also acknowledges hopes that "the revised closures—which will operate year-round until at least 2033—will decrease mortality of African penguins and improve their breeding success at the six colonies around which they have been implemented."
"However," it adds, "in the face of the ongoing impact of climate change on the abundance and distribution of their key prey, other interventions are likely to be needed."
Lorien Pichegru, a marine biology professor at South Africa's Nelson Mandela University who was not involved in the study, called the findings "extremely concerning" and warned the Guardian that the low fish numbers require urgent action "not only for African penguins but also for other endemic species depending on these stocks."
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In 'Historic Victory' for Oceans, Norway Pauses Controversial Deep-Sea Mining Plans
"We will not let this industry destroy the unique life in the deep sea, not in the Arctic, nor anywhere else," one campaigner said.
Dec 03, 2025
In a move celebrated by environmental advocates as a "massive win for nature," the Norwegian government on Wednesday delayed the issuing of deep-sea mining licenses in its Arctic waters for a second year in a row, this time until 2029.
In January 2024, Norway drew massive criticism from ocean campaigners and scientists when it became the first European country to open its waters to the controversial practice. Since then, however, smaller parties have twice succeeded in delaying the granting of licenses in return for passing the yearly budget.
“Deep-sea mining in Norway has once again been successfully stopped," Haldis Tjeldflaat Helle, the deep-sea mining campaigner at Greenpeace Nordic, said in a statement. "We will not let this industry destroy the unique life in the deep sea, not in the Arctic, nor anywhere else."
Wednesday's decision came as part of the new Labour government's budget negotiations, as the Reds, the Socialist Left Party, and the Green Party all opposed granting licenses. To pass its state budget, the government agreed "not to launch the first tenders for deep-sea mining during the current legislative term," which lasts four years, according to Agence France-Presse. The agreement comes a year after a similar intervention by the Socialist Left Party delayed the first round of licenses.
"Wherever this industry tries to start, it fails. We can protect the oceans from extraction."
The Norwegian government also said it would no longer direct public funds toward mapping for minerals, which Greenpeace called a "major shift in its stance on deep-sea mining."
The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) agreed, saying, "This decision represents a significant shift in Norway’s position and is a historic victory for nature, science, and public pressure."
A 2024 Greenpeace report warned that mining the Arctic seabed could cause "irreversible harm" to its unique ecosystems and even drive some as yet unstudied species extinct.
“This decision is a historic victory. Norwegian politicians decided to listen to scientific expertise and to the strong public demand to protect the vulnerable deep-sea environment, rather than being swayed by the mining lobby,” Karoline Andaur, CEO of WWF-Norway, said in a statement.
Louisa Casson, a Greenpeace International deep-sea mining campaigner, wrote on social media: "Deep-sea miners thought it would be easy to start mining the Arctic seafloor… But thanks to campaigning, Norway has just halted all deep-sea mining development! Wherever this industry tries to start, it fails. We can protect the oceans from extraction."
Deep-sea mining opponents like Greenpeace saw Norway's decision as "another blow" to an industry that has faced widespread popular opposition. It follows the decision by the Cook Islands last month to postpone a determination on deep-sea mining until 2032.
“There is no version of seabed mining that is sustainable or safe," Greenpeace Aotearoa campaigner Juressa Lee said in a statement at the time. "Alongside our allies who want to protect the ocean for future generations, we will continue to say a loud and bold no to miners who want to strip the seafloor for their profit.”
Following its pause on licenses, environmental advocates want Norway to bolster the growing momentum against deep-sea mining by joining the nations who have signed on in support of a global moratorium.
"Now Norway must step up and become a real ocean leader, join the call for a global moratorium against deep-sea mining, and bring forward a proposal of real protection for the Arctic deep sea," Helle said.
WWF's Andaur noted that "as cochair of the High-Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy, Norway now has a unique opportunity be consistent and stand alongside their cochair Palau and the 40 countries already supporting a global moratorium or pause on deep-seabed mining, turning this national pause into true global ocean leadership."
“Millions of people across the world are calling on governments to resist the dire threat of deep-sea mining to safeguard oceans worldwide," Greenpeace's Casson said. "This is yet another huge step forward to protect the Arctic, and now it is time for Norway to join over 40 countries calling for a moratorium and be a true ocean champion."
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