US and China Court Cook Islands as Pacific Seabed Minerals Race Intensifies

A vast mineral resource, an unresolved choice

The Cook Islands controls close to 2 million square kilometers of ocean, where officials estimate that billions of metric tons of mineral nodules lie on the seabed. Those deposits have drawn competing offers of scientific and technical cooperation from the United States and China, placing a small Pacific nation at the center of a contest over resources, international rules and influence.

As of October 25, 2025, the country prohibits seabed mining. Three operators hold exploration licenses, two with US links and one owned in the Cook Islands. Their work is to survey the ocean floor and study whether extraction could be feasible. Commercial extraction has not begun anywhere, and the International Seabed Authority has issued no mining licenses.

The attraction lies in rocks roughly the size of potatoes, scattered thousands of meters below the surface. Called polymetallic nodules, they contain cobalt, nickel, manganese, copper and traces of rare earth elements. These materials have uses in electric vehicles, electricity storage, advanced electronics and defense systems. Rising demand and pressure on deposits on land have brought the ocean floor into sharper focus.

Washington is funding research and mapping, while Beijing has established a formal cooperation program covering science, training and technology. Both governments present their involvement as support for responsible development. Both also have strategic interests in reliable mineral supplies and in the rules governing the deep ocean.

For Cook Islanders, the immediate choice concerns how to gather reliable evidence and who should help produce it. The larger decision is whether possible income for public services and climate resilience could justify disturbing ecosystems that scientists say may recover extremely slowly, if at all.

Why these waters attract attention

The Cook Islands lies roughly halfway between Hawaii and New Zealand. Its exclusive economic zone, the maritime area where it holds rights over natural resources, is many times larger than its land area. Internal studies and outside analyses suggest that its nodule deposits could rank among the largest concentrations in the Pacific.

The Seabed Minerals Authority oversees policy, environmental baseline studies and compliance. A baseline is a record of conditions before an activity begins, allowing later measurements to show what has changed. For a possible seabed mine, that means understanding the animals, habitats, sediments and water conditions before machinery enters the area.

The three exploration operators are gathering information about both mineral resources and feasibility. Exploration and extraction involve different decisions: surveying an area can help describe what is there, while mining would remove nodules and disturb their surroundings. Cook Islands leaders say any move beyond exploration requires rigorous science, transparent rules and safeguards for the marine environment and local livelihoods.

Exploration ships, research vessels and government agencies are now working around this potential resource. Their findings will shape decisions about a marine space that also supports culture, fisheries and protected habitats. The country is still collecting data and conducting environmental assessments, with no date given for a decision on whether mining could proceed.

Washington combines research with a licensing push

President Donald Trump signed an executive order in April directing US agencies to accelerate work on seabed minerals. It opened a route toward permits under a 1980 law that predates current global rules, and instructed officials to support exploration in US waters and beyond national jurisdiction.

The order marked a departure from decades of informal US alignment with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Washington has not ratified that treaty, but has generally followed its navigation and maritime rules. Encouraging domestic permits for activity outside national waters puts that alignment under pressure.

The United States has also launched a research partnership with the Cook Islands. A US research vessel is surveying parts of its seabed, and the initiative includes funding for local capacity, mapping, data collection and technical assistance. Its stated purpose is to help the country evaluate its choices.

The two governments set out their approach in a joint statement on cooperation published by the US State Department in August 2025. The statement connects scientific research and environmental stewardship with economic self reliance, high standards and transparency. It also highlights US linked firms working on research in Cook Islands waters.

The US and Cook Islands governments described their shared commitment in the statement:

Together, we commit to advancing responsible development of seabed minerals and global scientific understanding of the deep ocean, and to setting a high standard for transparent seabed resource management.

Shortly after the April executive order, a US affiliate of The Metals Company applied for a license to mine in international waters under US domestic law. That application challenged the existing international system and created the prospect of disputes over jurisdiction. Pacific partners must now weigh Washington's promise of careful scientific cooperation alongside its attempt to open another route to mining approval.

China builds cooperation through research and training

China already has an extensive presence in international seabed exploration. Its government backed entities hold more exploration contracts in international waters than those of any other country. Beijing has invested in research ships, collection technology and seabed mapping, while building influence in rulemaking at the International Seabed Authority, known as the ISA.

The Cook Islands signed a memorandum with China in February establishing a joint committee and cooperation on seabed research, capacity building and technology transfer. Officials said the agreement granted no mining rights and left domestic rules in place. China has said its cooperation will follow international law, including principles of the law of the sea.

The Cook Islands government released details of its action plan with China after calls for greater transparency. The plan included a grant worth several million dollars, to be paid once, and identified cooperation in hydrography, logistics and ocean research. Hydrography involves measuring and describing bodies of water and the seabed. The plan contained no security provisions.

Beijing has also explored closer resource cooperation with Kiribati. In the Cook Islands, Chinese technical assistance and American scientific support give the government more resources and greater bargaining power. They also increase the demands on a small administration responsible for assessing complex evidence, managing outside interests and defending its own priorities.

Who has authority over the seabed?

The ISA, established under the law of the sea, regulates mineral activities on seabeds beyond national jurisdiction. It has issued dozens of exploration contracts, but negotiations over a detailed mining code have continued for years. That code would set the conditions for commercial operations, including environmental requirements.

Many governments and scientists want the ISA to move slowly or pause while the risks become better understood. Dozens of countries support a pause, and a growing group, including several Pacific nations, has backed calls for a moratorium. Companies holding exploration contracts want clarity about when and how they could seek permission to produce minerals.

The United States is neither a party to the law of the sea treaty nor an ISA member. Its move toward domestic licensing beyond national waters creates a direct challenge to the international framework. Legal experts warn that unilateral approvals could weaken common rules, encourage similar action by other governments and complicate any later return to a shared system. Such licensing may also face lawsuits and diplomatic opposition.

China participates fully in ISA processes and regularly presents its approach as consistent with international law. Strategic concerns extend beyond legal membership, however. Some analysts caution that technology used for seabed work can also support military mapping, surveillance and work involving undersea infrastructure. Operations under any flag can therefore involve environmental, legal and strategic interests that cross borders.

What mining would do to the ocean floor

The most likely targets are nodules resting on soft sediment in the abyss. A proposed mining system would send a large robotic collector across the seabed, lift the nodules into a pipe and carry them to a vessel at the surface. Water separated from the nodules would then return to the sea.

The collector would disturb sediments and organisms along its route. Pumps and support ships would add noise, while lights could affect animals adapted to darkness. Sediment stirred up at the bottom could spread in a plume, smother marine life and carry metals through the water. Discharging wastewater higher in the water column would create another plume, with effects that remain poorly understood.

The deep ocean is cold and dark, and many of its species grow and reproduce slowly. Scientists warn that damage could be severe and possibly irreversible. Noise and vibration may disrupt animals that depend on faint signals, while changes to habitats could affect sponges, corals and microbes. Some historical test sites show little recovery after decades.

Douglas McCauley, a professor of ocean science at the University of California who has studied mining plumes and the resilience of deep ecosystems, has warned about both the rush toward extraction and the risks of wastewater discharge:

"The mining that is being proposed would happen in some of the most fragile or the least resilient ecosystems on the planet," McCauley said.

McCauley also described the new rush into the deep as a "very dangerous opening of Pandora's box." His concerns include the damage that wastewater could cause without tight controls.

Engineers argue that seabed extraction may avoid some harms associated with mines on land, including deforestation, displacement and tailings dams, which hold mining waste. Opponents point to the poorly measured risks facing ecosystems that may persist for long periods and recover slowly. Fisheries concerns also extend beyond the waters directly above a mining site: tuna and other species migrate across the Pacific and depend on food webs that widespread disturbance could alter.

Research reveals life and gaps in knowledge

The exploration vessel E V Nautilus has worked with local partners in recent months to photograph and film deep habitats in Cook Islands waters. Operated by a US based ocean exploration trust with support from US agencies, the vessel documented corals, sponges and burrowing creatures. It also produced images showing seabed features in detail inside the country's marine protected area.

Local environmental groups welcomed the information while calling for DNA and environmental DNA sampling. Environmental DNA is genetic material that organisms leave in their surroundings; studying it can help identify life that cameras may miss. The Seabed Minerals Authority said the image quality would help identify larger species and improve baseline mapping.

Engineers and regulators are also testing monitoring standards. Australia's national science agency has developed frameworks based on risk and methods for tracking pollutants and biological effects in the Clarion Clipperton Zone, between Hawaii and Mexico. Several Pacific nations hold exploration contracts in that region.

Scientific baselines remain incomplete in many license areas, and researchers and regulators still disagree about what level of environmental harm would be acceptable. Monitoring methods must address both changes near a collector and effects from plumes elsewhere in the water. The Cook Islands' assessments are therefore part of a wider effort to understand damage before deciding whether it can be controlled.

Cook Islanders weigh income against ocean protection

Public opinion in the Cook Islands is divided. Some residents see mineral income as a possible way to fund health care, education and resilience to climate change. Others fear lasting damage to the ocean that supports their livelihoods and culture.

Protests have greeted returning vessels that visited exploration license areas to collect images and samples. Banners warned against mining the moana, the ocean. Civil society groups have called for independent oversight, more time for research and stronger public consultation.

Edward Herman, a senior official at the Seabed Minerals Authority, has stressed that cooperation with China, the United States and other partners concerns marine science at this stage. The government's stated position is that it will decide only when the science is clear and the public has been heard.

Alanna Matamaru Smith, director of the Te Ipukarea Society, wants stronger independent checks and wider public engagement. She argues that research should not be shaped by those hoping to profit, and worries that the priorities of larger powers could overwhelm local voices. Describing the dependence on companies and foreign governments for information, she said:

At the end of the day, the research is still being developed by the mining companies, as well as relying on China and the United States to come in and provide data," she said. "They're these mighty states in the world. And we're the little Cook Islands.

New Zealand, which has constitutional ties with the Cook Islands, objected when the China agreements were signed without consultation. Wellington paused budget support, then welcomed the new US cooperation focused on science and stewardship. Former Australian prime minister Scott Morrison, speaking at a regional forum, said the Cook Islands should be free to choose and to build national wealth from its seabed if it wishes.

The commercial case depends on more than deposits

The Clarion Clipperton Zone attracts companies and governments because of its vast size, dense nodule deposits and relatively simple seabed terrain compared with other mineral provinces. The Metals Company has published resource estimates for parts of its claims and tested collection systems.

Financial backers argue that electric vehicles and energy storage will sustain demand and prices for cobalt and nickel. They view seabed minerals as a potential supplement or alternative to supplies from places where mining on land carries high social and environmental costs.

Critics point to changes in battery chemistry, including moves toward lower cobalt content. Recycling and substitution could also reduce pressure for new extraction. Companies that overestimate demand or underestimate operating costs risk leaving expensive vessels and collectors idle.

The Cook Islands would need to account for more than metal prices in any economic model. Environmental safeguards, monitoring, emergency funds, liability for damage and stewardship over many years would all carry costs. Any system for sharing revenue would also have to reflect community priorities and rules governing protected areas.

Undersea cables present another practical concern. These connections carry the global internet, and Pacific island states depend on a small number of links for communications and commerce. Engineers warn that heavy machinery and disturbed sediment could threaten cables where routes and mining operations overlap. Shared mapping, advance notice and a regional code of conduct could reduce the risk, but those practices are not yet standardized.

The decisions taking shape

The Cook Islands faces overlapping scientific, commercial and diplomatic processes. Washington is pursuing domestic licensing while supporting research; Beijing is building cooperation through science and training. At the ISA, negotiations continue between governments seeking clear production rules and those pressing for a pause.

The main developments during 2025 show how quickly the competing approaches have gathered pace:

• February: The Cook Islands signed a memorandum with China establishing a joint committee and cooperation on seabed research, capacity building and technology transfer.
• April: President Trump directed US agencies to accelerate seabed mineral activity, including work beyond national jurisdiction. A US affiliate of The Metals Company applied for a mining license shortly afterward.
• August: The United States and Cook Islands set out their cooperation on seabed mineral resources in a joint statement stressing science, transparency and responsible development.
• October 25: The Cook Islands remains engaged in research and environmental assessment, with mining prohibited and public debate continuing.

The country's eventual choice will depend on the strength of the evidence, community views and whether an enforcement system can be trusted to protect its waters. Pacific leaders identify transparency, independent science and respect for local decisions as central standards. China's research and training relationships are likely to keep expanding, while Washington's licensing approach faces possible legal and diplomatic challenges.

For the Cook Islands, diversifying partners can bring investment and knowledge. Its leaders must also ensure that outside competition serves national priorities, including protection of the ocean that defines the country's home and livelihoods.

The Bottom Line

• The Cook Islands' vast ocean territory and mineral nodules have attracted competing US and Chinese research partnerships.
• Mining remains prohibited in the country. Three operators hold exploration licenses, and commercial seabed extraction has not begun anywhere.
• The United States is supporting scientific cooperation while pursuing a domestic route to licensing activity beyond national waters.
• China's agreement covers research, training and technology transfer, without granting mining rights.
• Scientists warn of lasting harm from sediment plumes, wastewater, noise and disturbance of slowly recovering ecosystems.
• Cook Islanders are divided between possible income for public needs and risks to the ocean, with calls for independent research and stronger consultation.
• ISA mining rules remain under negotiation, while dozens of countries support a pause.
• Any economic decision must account for changing mineral demand, environmental costs, liability, protected areas and infrastructure risks.