As the international community grapples with the accelerating pace of climate change, residents in Pacific Island nations are at the cutting edge of the threat posed by rising sea levels—and another posed, surprisingly, by some efforts to mitigate it.

On the seafloor, rocks containing polymetallic nodules are rich in manganese, nickel, copper, and cobalt—so-called critical minerals for the electric-vehicle industry. But the process by which they are mined raises ecological concerns. While the International Seabed Authority, the United Nations body that regulates exploitation of the deep-sea floor, considers applications for deep-sea mining, scientists, governments, and even companies such as Google, BMW, and Samsung have called for a moratorium until the risks are fully understood.

This year, Sarah Noël Manney, JD ’24 (BA ’18), participated in a summer internship through Stanford Law School’s John and Terry Levin Center for Public Service and Public Interest Law and the Stanford Center for East Asian Studies, organized by Jenik Radon, JD ’71, to work with French Polynesia’s newly elected government. As part of her summer placement at the Office of the President of French Polynesia, Manney analyzed the legal framework around deep-sea mining. “Some forms of deep-sea mining have been compared with open-pit mining, and all could potentially be devastating for ocean ecosystems due to ocean currents,” she says. “But it is still an under-examined issue.”

French Polynesia has a particular concern in protecting its marine environment, which has at its core its people’s attachment to the seas. As a French colony, it was the site of nearly 200 offshore nuclear tests conducted from the 1960s to the 1990s, leaving the islands with a burdened legacy of significant ecosystem pollution and health consequences.

Manney’s research focused on identifying measures the government might take to preserve the marine environment if deep-sea mining near the country is internationally approved. The first part involved analyzing the UN Convention on the Law of the Seas  to understand pathways of legal recourse for damage from seabed operations. Then, she examined the division of jurisdictional and governing competences between French Polynesia and France, to understand consequences and constitutional issues if the former decides to permit the exploitation of resources in its exclusive economic zone.

Radon, an adjunct professor at the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University, has worked or lectured in more than 75 countries and advises public authorities and civil society across the globe. He is the founder and director of the Eesti and Eurasian Public Service Fellowship (and associated programs, including the Heidi B. Duerbeck fund at SLS, created in honor of his wife, JD ’72), which has given students from Columbia, Stanford Law School, and other institutions the opportunity to intern with government authorities and civil societies in emerging nations on all continents. He started working with Stanford Law’s Levin Center in 2004, organizing internships on international matters in which he is personally engaged. He works with each student as an advisor and mentor. To date, more than 20 SLS students have been placed in more than 10 countries and have worked with a variety of government agencies including Namibia’s Ministry of Education, Tanzania’s Anti-Corruption Division, the Philippines’ Health Ministry, and Estonia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Here, Radon and Manney discuss deep-sea mining with French Polynesian President Moetai Brotherson.

­­— by Sharon Driscoll

RADON: Mr. President, thank you for speaking with us and for welcoming us recently to French Polynesia to study deep-sea mining and other issues critical to your country’s environment, economy, and your people’s future. Something that impressed us both was the deep, historic, and cultural relationship of the Polynesian people with the seas. So, the natural question is how do these traditional cultural bonds impact and shape your government’s approach to ocean stewardship, supporting healthy and sustainable fishing, and, specifically, to the challenges presented by prospective natural resource exploitation through deep-sea mining?

BROTHERSON: Polynesians are descendants of both navigators and fishermen. We belong to the ocean and not the contrary. In our myths, in our stories told through the ages, we come from the ocean. As president, as ministers, we are custodians of this ocean that we need to maintain as a living and vibrant legacy for future generations. We have a responsibility to find the middle way between developing our natural resources to feed us and to protect the ocean. My government works toward a sustainable economy providing food and also income for the fishing industry, but in a way that preserves the fish stocks for future generations. We want to triple our fishing capacity over the next decade. However, marine pollution, plastics, nuclear waste, and, prospectively, deep-sea mining are a threat to the sustainable economy based on fisheries that we are seeking to build.

RADON: One critical concern about deep-sea mining is the lack of scientific understanding of its potential effects on fish and the health of ocean ecosystems. Moreover, the technology for undertaking environment-protective deep-sea mining can, at best, be described as still in the making. What would you say to those who believe that the rising demand for minerals, like cobalt, to meet the needs of the technology required to counter the effects of climate change warrants pushing ahead with deep-sea mining, despite the environmental and health risks and our overall lack of scientific and technical knowledge? Should French Polynesia adopt the precautionary principle, which has been adopted as the guiding principle in European Union rulemaking but is opposed by commercial interests, especially in common law jurisdictions?

BROTHERSON: First, environmental impact assessments will be needed for deep-sea mining as there is a customary tradition, as well as a legal requirement, to restore an area after mining operations are over—[but] admittedly this has not always been complied with. How will this be done for deep-sea mining? The experts do not know. In fact, we have too little knowledge about the ecology of the deep seas. It’s fundamental to wait for a less destructive and polluting technology to be developed. Deep-sea mining with its “vacuum cleaner” technology, which will simply sweep up everything, is polluting. We in French Polynesia-Maohi Nui have adopted the precautionary rule. This means not only to be cautious but also not to act before you know: No greenwashing speech claiming that the development of copper and other minerals in the deep sea is sustainable and is needed to combat climate change. Alternative opportunities need to be created and developed for our insular economies. The private commercial mining industry that is lobbying the Pacific countries hard should not take advantage of economically distressed countries. We would simply be causing the problems of tomorrow today. Many scientists have said we may be causing even more serious problems. We have to study the entire supply chain, and not just believe that minerals, wherever they may be, are the solution.

MANNEY: Some of your neighbors in the Pacific argue that natural resource exploitation, including deep-sea mining, is necessary for economic growth. Admittedly, all countries, including French Polynesia, need to develop and offer their people opportunities, livelihoods, and a better tomorrow. So, what are alternative economic opportunities for your country?

BROTHERSON: In our program, we have defined these pillars to build our economy:

Tourism. We would like to triple the number of tourists, up to 600,000 tourists per year.

Green and blue economy. Our ocean, as I have said, is our future. Our EEZ, exclusive economic zone, which is about 5 million square kilometers, is the second largest in the Pacific after Australia’s. Fisheries and also aquaculture are necessities for us. For that we need to adapt our education curriculum.

Digital economy is fundamental in today’s world. We want to have another cable to become a Pacific Genius Lab for innovation and technologies and to develop our e-governance and business. Given Stanford’s strength in technology, we invite the university to support us in this initiative. We also would welcome Stanford alums in the Silicon Valley companies to join and support us.

Sustainable energies are also essential so that we can import fewer hydrocarbons.

RADON: The suspected effects of deep-sea mining are transnational, if not global, for the simple reason sea currents know no borders. The International Seabed Authority, entrusted with the management of the oceans, has yet to come up with laws and regulations to permit and govern deep-sea mining. This can be attributed to the lack of the world’s knowledge of the seas, the oceans. Do you feel we still need more time before such laws and regulations can be effectively drafted and thereafter adopted?

BROTHERSON: Yes, we need more time. Laws, in the case of deep-sea mining, cannot be adopted faster than science and knowledge. Exploration should be carried on, and it should be extensive—to really know better the deep-sea ecosystem, to collect and share data, and to allow for future meaningful environmental impact assessments. Moreover, the laws should not be adopted before less destructive technologies are developed, as the laws and regulations will have to take account of the technologies.

MANNEY: I, together with a graduate student from Columbia, Xenia Wang, was fortunate to be among the first international scholars your government received to consult on environmental, economic, and legal issues. Are you looking for more scholars from Stanford?

BROTHERSON: Sarah wrote a very analytical report. I have to say that it was more insightful than what we are used to. We really appreciated having Sarah and Xenia with us, and we are definitely ready to welcome more students from Stanford, Columbia, and other leading U.S. universities dedicated to protecting the environment and who understand our country’s need to develop our economies in order to stop staring at the abyss. However, my government has an obligation to give the people of French Polynesia opportunities and a future. We do not need a continuation of the neocolonial approach, meaning people telling us only what not to do. We need people with skills and talent to help us, and work with us, in building a sustainable economy. So, yes, we want more Stanford students.  SL

Jenik Radon and Sarah Manney thank President Moetai Brotherson, Mareva Lechat-Kitalong, Hoanui Mariassouce, Bruno Vaitoare, Gabriel Colombani, Emilia Manin, and many others at the Delegation for International, European, and Pacific Affairs for their hospitality, kindness, and passion in making this project possible.