Navigating Environmental Approval Pathways for Deep Seabed Mining Projects in Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction (the Area)

Deep-seabed mining (DSM) is a developing industry with high potential to help meet the metal demand for the transition to a renewable energy world. No DSM projects have yet received environmental approval, although several are in progress, following the Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA) process that has been developed and widely applied for projects in national jurisdictions. Currently, the International Seabed Authority's (ISA) regulations, standards, and guidelines for mineral exploitation of seabed minerals in the Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction (the Area) are in draft form. Proponents are guided in their ESIA studies by the ISA's Recommendations for the Guidance of Contractors for the Assessment of the Possible Environmental Impacts Arising From Exploration for Marine Minerals in the Area and are proceeding in expectation that the currently draft regulations will be finalized by the time an environmental impact statement can be submitted. This paper discusses the pathways leading to environmental assessment and approvals, comparing the processes in national jurisdictions with those for projects in the Area.

Contested extractivism: impact assessment, public engagement, and environmental knowledge production in Alaska's Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta

For large extractive mineral projects, Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) processes function in part as a procedural tool to adjudicate the legitimacy of divergent environmental truth claims. Successful anti-extraction movements work to litigate divergent knowledge claims in the public arena, but few anti-extraction communities have access to a broad public audience. This article examines the proposed Donlin Gold mine in southwestern Alaska, a locally divisive yet publicly invisible extraction controversy, to understand how communities contest the boundaries of knowledge production and legitimacy set out by EIS procedures without the benefit of broad public awareness. Through a multi-method analysis of the public engagement segment of Donlin's Draft EIS, we find that anti-Donlin activists worked to construct environmental knowledge that drew jointly on claims to local knowledge and scientific expertise through a temporary assemblage of local activists and external consultants. The contested epistemic understandings of residents, expert consultants, and state and federal regulators further reveal the role of regulatory processes in constructing and maintaining boundaries of epistemic legitimacy, while also pointing to emergent possibilities for social action based in locally-situated environmental truth claims.Key Words: Environmental Impact Statement, mining, truth claims, Donlin Gold mine, Alaska