What is the global evidence for effects of marine critical mineral mining on marine ecosystems? A systematic map protocol

Details

• Journal Title:
  Proceed
• Personal Author:
  Paxton, Avery B. ; Gove, Jamison M. ; Methratta, Elizabeth T. ; Andrews, Kelly S. ; Drazen, Jeffrey C. ; Klajbor, Willem ; Lowry, Dayv ; Marvasti, Akbar ; Riley, Trevor N. ; Vavoulis, Phoebe
• NOAA Program & Office:
  NMFS (National Marine Fisheries Service) ; NEFSC (Northeast Fisheries Science Center) ; NWFSC (Northwest Fisheries Science Center) ; PIFSC (Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center) ; SEFSC (Southeast Fisheries Science Center) ; SWFSC (Southwest Fisheries Science Center) ; WCR (West Coast Region) ; CIMAS (Cooperative Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Studies) ; OAR (Oceanic and Atmospheric Research)
• Description:
  Given growing interest in mining for marine critical minerals (e.g., U.S. Executive Order 14285), there is a timely need to synthesize evidence on potential impacts to marine ecosystems. Synthesized information will help inform decisions by resource managers, industry, and other entities tasked with establishing frameworks for deep-sea mining, as well as mining in shallower waters. As such, the objective of this systematic map is to document and quantify the global evidence for demonstrated and hypothesized effects of marine critical mineral mining on marine ecosystems. Specifically, the map aims to catalog knowledge clusters and knowledge gaps pertaining to biological, physical, chemical, social, and economic effects of the extraction of marine critical mineral deposits — including polymetallic nodules, polymetallic sulfides, cobalt-rich ferromanganese crusts, heavy mineral sands, phosphorites, and brine pools — through mining. The map also aims to summarize how the magnitude of evidence varies based on the mineral deposit type, mining approach, study type, and geography. Theory of change / causal model: Scientific consensus regarding effects of seabed mining on marine ecosystems generally suggests that there are more unknowns than knowns (e.g., (Drazen et al. 2020, Amon et al. 2022)), especially given the extensive timeframes typically needed for deep-sea seafloor ecosystem recovery (Simon-Lledo et al. 2019, Jones et al. 2025). Recent publications highlight concerns regarding mining impacts (Glover et al. 2026), such as those associated with altered microbial (Vonnahme et al. 2020) and macrofaunal (Stewart et al. 2026) communities, toxicological effects on benthic suspension feeders (Martins et al. 2017, Carreiro-Silva et al. 2022), identification of toxicity thresholds for regulation (Hauton et al. 2017) changes in tourist behavior (Folkersen et al. 2018), and anticipated spatial overlap between mining areas and tuna fisheries (van der Grient and Drazen 2021, Amon et al. 2023).
• Source:
  PROCEED-26-00492
• DOI:
  https://doi.org/10.57808/proceed.2026.19
• Format:
  PDF
• Document Type:
  Journal Article
• License:
  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Rights Information:
  CC BY
• Compliance:
  Submitted
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:331b4bba0ebf73d5700ebbd1ee347504e84d780bb159683499e908e7b3abe0c9f899928c0dd074032d5cfee96eca2bf59edeb262ecd6c2aedfd6a9332829f55f
• Download URL:
  https://repository.library.noaa.gov/view/noaa/73542/noaa_73542_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 116.17 KB ]