Norway is inviting comments on Arctic seabed areas it plans to offer for deep sea mining ahead of formally awarding permits for the first time.
The Nordic country is one of the first to take a step that has been highly criticized by environmental and fishing groups due to the possible damage to marine life. The European Parliament has also voiced concern, while the bloc’s green deal chief, Maros Sefcovic, said in March that the European Union would monitor the process. Norway is not a member of the bloc.
© BloombergThe government on Wednesday proposed to put forward 386 blocks in the Arctic as part of the first licensing round. The area makes up about 38% of the 280,000 square kilometers (108,000 square miles) opened for exploration of minerals on the continental shelf off the Norwegian coast earlier this year, with backing of the country’s parliament.
The government plans to award licenses in the first half of next year, Energy Minister Terje Aasland said on Wednesday.
“The world needs minerals for the green transition, and the government wants to explore if it’s possible to extract seabed minerals in a sustainable manner from the Norwegian continental shelf,” Aasland said in the statement, citing the country’s “long experience” managing ocean-based resources.
Norway has said it will tread carefully and will only approve exploitation plans that show that a project can be implemented in a sustainable and responsible manner. But environmental groups have questioned the process the country is following.
“Researchers have been unanimous; we have too little knowledge about the deep sea, and even just exploring it can have catastrophic consequences for marine life and the vital ecosystem processes we find there,” Gytis Blazevicius, leader of Norwegian environmental organization Nature and Youth, said in an email. “In the future, we will look back at 2024 as the fateful year when we could have made the right choice.”
The proposal is being presented for public consultation, with a deadline of Sept. 26 for any comments. Any plans for extraction must be approved by both the ministry and the Norwegian parliament.
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