New uses and abuses of the seabed. Legal challenges

The project aims to the drafting of a book "The Law of the Seabed", with sub-title: "Access, uses and protection of seabed resources". The seabed corresponds to the ground at the bottom of the sea or the ocean. Multiple activities are already been carried out both on and under the seabed. Seabed uses encompass: oil and gas exploration and exploitation, laying of infrastructures including pipelines, cables and compression infrastructures, mineral exploitation, waste disposal, military uses, use of biological resources, ocean energy resources exploitation, cultural and recreational resources. New uses are also foreseen such as carbon dioxide storage, further exploitation of mineral resources and increasing number of infrastructures laid on the seabed. Technological progress makes access to the seabed easier, providing for new possibilities but raising risks of excess or abuses, conflicts and pollution. The high environmental value of the seabed is a concern, reflected by the status of common heritage of mankind given to the deep seabed and the need for developing new dedicated protection mechanisms. The book is based on the observation that those uses, and sometimes abuses of the seabed, are multiple, but are also multiplying without necessarily the appropriate legal framework. The ocean sector, including in relation to the seabed, is a direct contributor to the national economies. But those multiple usages entail certain responsibilities going beyond national borders and command coordination and cooperation. Efforts to frame the uses of the seabed for different purposes have developed since the 1960s, including at the level of the United Nations, but need to be adapted to the most recent developments. The seabed can also be an area of conflicts, either for accessing it or using its resources. Both public and private instruments have developed to tackle possible opposing jurisdiction claims, conflicting uses or coexistence between different activities.

The project aims to the drafting of a book in English on the theme "new uses and abuses of the seabed". The project will gather international academics which will review and assess the different aspects of the uses and abuses of the seabed from different legal perspectives and in different jurisdictions. There has not been any major legal academic publication on the topic in recent years, and the book project aims to fill this gap, contributing to new knowledge. The choice of the topic is based on the observation that the uses of the seabed are already multiple and are multiplying without necessarily the appropriate legal framework.