SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — A legal environmental group sued the U.S. government on Tuesday to halt the Trump administration's plans announced last month to auction off sections of water surrounding American Samoa for potential deep-sea mining.
Earthjustice filed the lawsuit against the U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service and U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on behalf of two groups: Fa‘asao Amerika Samoa and Conservation Council for Hawai‘i.
The legal nonprofit is requesting that a judge order the National Marine Fisheries Service to stop moving forward with its plans and to comply with the Endangered Species Act and other federal laws.
“The United States has never opened its waters to deep-sea mining. Until now,” the lawsuit stated.
It noted that the U.S. plans to sell leases with the intention of allowing mining across some 33 million acres (13.4 million hectares) of seabed off American Samoa that is rich in minerals including nickel, cobalt and manganese that are used to build batteries, electronics and other products.
The lawsuit stated that the U.S. first must ensure that such activity will not destroy critical habitats or push species closer to extinction.
The environmental group called a recent decision by the National Marine Fisheries Service that leases would not affect critical habitat or endangered or threatened species “a wholly arbitrary and capricious determination.”
“The Samoan people rely upon a healthy ocean ecosystem,” the lawsuit reads. “This ecosystem feeds Samoan households, protects shorelines, and has formed the basis of many cultural practices that have existed for over a millennium.”
It noted that many animals around American Samoa also migrate to Hawaiian waters, including sea turtles known as “i‘a sa,” which means “sacred fish.”
American Samoa views whales, sharks, giant manta rays and other animals as sacred, and there’s a ban on catching or harming such species.
The environmental group asserted that failure to comply with U.S. acts is harming “professional, scientific, educational, aesthetic, spiritual, and cultural interests” in American Samoan and Hawaiian waters.
It said that waters surrounding American Samoa support "rare and diverse marine species" including shallow and mesophotic coral reefs, sponges, crabs, deep-sea cucumbers, sea turtles and hundreds of coral and fish species.
The organization noted that the waters serve as habitat to five sea turtle populations and four types of whales that are all endangered, as well as five coral species and four animals including the giant manta ray that are threatened.
The area that the U.S. envisions leasing is 57 miles (92 kilometers) from the Rose Atoll National Wildlife Refuge.
The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump is seeking to expedite mining permits even as dozens of countries have called for a moratorium or ban on deep sea mining because of environmental concerns including noise, light and suffocating dust storms.
“To date, there has not been a commercial seabed mining operation established anywhere in the world,” Earthjustice said in its lawsuit.
The International Seabed Authority, a Jamaica-based U.N. body that oversees deep international waters, has authorized exploration licenses for nearly two dozen contractors, but it has not allowed any commercial mining.
Much of the ongoing exploration is centered in the Clarion-Clipperton Fracture Zone, which covers 1.7 million square miles (4.4 million square kilometers) between Hawaii and Mexico.
The U.S. has not ratified the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, so the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration regulates U.S. exploration and commercial recovery of minerals.
A spokesperson with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s fisheries service told The Associated Press on Tuesday that it was unable to comment on litigation matters.
The U.S. Department of Commerce did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
On Monday, the U.S. government published a proposed leasing notice for federal waters surrounding the Northern Mariana Islands for a total of 69 million acres (28 million hectares).
“Critical minerals are essential to America’s national security, economic strength and resource sovereignty,” said Matt Giacona, acting director of the Marine Minerals Administration.
"The United States cannot afford to depend on foreign nations for the resources that power our economy and support our defense industrial base."
The move was widely condemned by scientists and environmentalists.
“It’s disgraceful that the Trump administration is bulldozing ahead with plans to allow deep-sea mining while the people who live closest to the proposed project are rightfully demanding that it be stopped,” said Nick Katkevich, an oceans campaigner at the Center for Biological Diversity.
"These massive mining projects are just too experimental and dangerous for marine life to allow them to go forward."
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