India to Apply for Deep-Sea Critical Minerals Mining in the Pacific

India plans to apply for obtaining licenses for deep-sea mining of minerals key for the energy transition in the Pacific, a senior government scientist told Reuters on Monday.  

India has been exploring ways to own and develop critical minerals assets abroad as its renewable energy rollout is soaring and as it seeks to have its own stream of supply of key metals such as lithium, nickel, and copper.

Now the country is getting ready to apply in 2025 with the UN-backed International Seabed Authority (ISA) for exploration licenses in the Pacific, M. Ravichandran, the top scientist at India’s Ministry of Earth Sciences, told Reuters.

The ministry will be working jointly with the Indian Ministry of Mines in the preparatory work to apply for licenses, the scientist told Reuters.  

ISA is an autonomous international organization established under the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and the 1994 Agreement relating to the Implementation of Part XI of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

The Jamaica-based ISA is the organization through which the member states, including India, organize and control all mineral-resources-related activities.

So far, ISA has issued 31 deep-sea exploration licenses, including two for India to mine the Indian Ocean. However, mining is not allowed yet by the authority as it is still finalizing regulations.

India is also looking at onshore South America to potentially develop resources of lithium and copper.

For example, state-held giant Coal India and a U.S. company are considering joint development of lithium assets in Argentina, under the U.S.-led pact for Minerals Security Partnership, Reuters reported last month, citing an Indian source with direct knowledge of the matter.

Earlier this year, India signed an agreement with the state-owned enterprise of Catamarca province in northwest Argentina for a lithium exploration and mining project in the Argentinian province.

To boost its energy transition efforts, India is also betting on acquiring lithium and copper assets overseas and sent earlier this year a delegation to search for such resources in Chile, a top producer of both critical minerals. 

By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com

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