Deep Seabed Mining Project Advances, Papua New Guinea Locals Consider Lawsuit

A controversial experiment to mine the ocean floor for gold and copper is inching closer to reality off the coast of Papua New Guinea, even as the coastal communities who would live alongside it say they’ve been kept almost entirely in the dark about what the project actually involves — and are now weighing legal action to force answers.

An Experiment Unlike Any Mining Project Before It

The project, known as Solwara 1, would be the world’s first commercial seabed mineral extraction operation, targeting sea-floor massive sulfide deposits — mineral-rich formations that build up around hydrothermal vents roughly 1.6 kilometers below the surface of the Bismarck Sea. The site sits approximately 25 to 30 kilometers off the west coast of New Ireland Province, in waters that hundreds of thousands of people have depended on for their livelihoods for generations, according to a detailed project overview from Source International.

Nautilus Minerals, the Canadian company behind the project, has been exploring Papua New Guinea’s waters since 1997 and received its environmental permit for Solwara 1 in 2009, followed by a 20-year mining license in 2011. The company began exploratory drilling at the site in 2016, moving the long-delayed project closer to actual commercial operation than it had ever previously come — even as basic questions about its environmental and economic impact remained unresolved for the communities living closest to it.

Years of Requests for Information, Met With Silence

That lack of clarity is not a new complaint. As far back as 2012, the Deep Sea Mining Campaign and the local advocacy group Mas Kagin Tapani wrote directly to Papua New Guinea’s then-prime minister, Peter O’Neill, requesting release of key documents related to Solwara 1’s licensing and anticipated impacts. That letter went unanswered, and the requested documents have never entered the public domain, according to the Deep Sea Mining Campaign’s own account of the years-long information fight.

Jonathan Mesulam, a community leader from the west coast of New Ireland Province whose village sits roughly 25 kilometers from the proposed mine site, has been one of the most consistent voices pressing for transparency. “Civil society in Papua New Guinea has been requesting this information for the past four years,” Mesulam said, describing a community that has grown increasingly frustrated with a government and mining company both unwilling to substantively engage with basic questions about a project poised to reshape the waters they depend on. “My people live only 25km from the proposed location for the Solwara 1 mine in the Bismarck Sea. If the mine goes ahead it will impact our lives and livelihoods.”

A Constitutional Right, Communities Argue, Being Ignored

Local advocates argue the government’s silence isn’t just frustrating — it’s a violation of Papua New Guineans’ own constitutional rights. Lucielle Paru of the Central Province Pressure Group has pointed to Section 51 of the country’s constitution, which guarantees citizens reasonable access to official government documents. “It is a sad condemnation of our national Government that we have to force them to share information about this experimental seabed mining project,” Paru said, capturing the sense among affected communities that legal action, however costly and uncertain, may be the only remaining path to the transparency the government has consistently declined to provide voluntarily.

Peter Bosip, executive director of the Centre for Environmental Law and Community Rights, has argued that the Solwara 1 Environmental Impact Statement itself is inadequate to answer the central questions communities are raising. “Communities likely to be impacted by the project have no choice but to bring legal proceedings against the PNG Government,” Bosip said, describing legal action not as a first resort, but as the last remaining option after years of unanswered requests.

An Uncertain Path Forward

Whether affected communities ultimately follow through on legal action, and whether Nautilus Minerals can overcome its own persistent financial difficulties to actually bring Solwara 1 into commercial operation, both remained genuinely open questions as the project moved into 2017. What was already clear is that a mining company promising to pioneer an entirely new category of ocean-floor extraction, and the communities living in its shadow, remained fundamentally divided over a basic question: whether Papua New Guineans have actually been told the truth about what’s coming to their waters.

For related coverage of extractive industry conflicts and community land rights, see our piece on Argentina’s Vaca Muerta shale fracking opposition, or browse our full Environment archive.