The Highest Grade Manganese in the World Sits Under U.S. Water. Nobody Has Financed It Yet.

 

American Samoa has the resource, the harbor, and now the federal runway. What it does not have is the operator willing to move first.

By Don Southerton, Founder and CEO, Bridging Culture Worldwide, and Managing Director, Critical Mineral Ventures, and Strategic Advisor ASEDC.

Start with a number that does not get enough attention. The polymetallic nodules in the American Samoa exclusive economic zone run at roughly 28 percent manganese by weight. That is the highest natural concentration of any known commercial deposit anywhere in the world.

Manganese is the quiet bottleneck in the battery supply chain. LFP and LMFP chemistry is scaling fast for grid storage and lower cost EVs, and both need battery grade manganese in volume. Processing capacity outside China is critically thin. The same nodule fields also carry nickel, cobalt, and copper, the exact four metals inside every EV battery cathode.

Deposits closest to the territory are estimated at 10 billion tons of high grade ore. Widen the circle to 1,000 miles around Pago Pago and the number moves past 100 billion tons.

This is no longer a concept paper. It is a permitting process with dates on it.

The Window Is Open Right Now

Four things converged inside eighteen months, and together they changed the risk profile of this opportunity.

•    Federal access. Executive Order 14285 opened U.S. offshore critical mineral development. On July 16, 2026, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management released a Proposed Leasing Notice covering roughly 18.1 million acres of Outer Continental Shelf near American Samoa. A Final Leasing Notice and a competitive lease sale are expected this fall.

•    Federal money. Roughly $10 billion in federal critical minerals commitments moved between January 2025 and June 2026. The Department of Energy stood up an Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation and has been awarding in tranches, including $134 million for rare earth demonstration projects in June and $162 million for recovery from industrial sources.

•    A federal buyer. Project Vault, the $12 billion strategic critical minerals reserve launched in February 2026, gave the sector something it has never had. A price floor and a buyer of last resort.

•    A hard deadline. Beginning January 1, 2027, U.S. manufacturers are restricted from sourcing rare earths, magnets, tungsten, molybdenum, and tantalum from covered foreign nations. Domestic and allied supply is nowhere close to ready. That gap is the entire investment thesis.

Why Pago Pago and Not Somewhere Else

Plenty of places have minerals offshore. Very few have a working industrial harbor sitting next to them under the U.S. flag.

•    A deep water port operating at commercial scale, with berthing, bunkering, and export logistics in place.

•    U.S. territory status, which means U.S. jurisdiction, U.S. labor, and material that clears the foreign entity of concern test automatically.

•    An existing heavy processing workforce and the utilities, housing, and services that support it.

•    A local government that moves at business speed rather than agency speed.

The build out is simple to describe and hard to do alone. A dedicated second deep water dock for seabed mineral receiving and loading. A refining plant. A customer specific end user manufacturing plant tied to a named offtaker.

The Korea Read

This is where my desk sits, so I will be direct about it. Samsung SDI, LG Energy Solution, and SK On are the largest non Chinese cell producers in the world and are scaling U.S. production toward 300 gigawatt hours and beyond by 2027 and 2028. Hyundai and Kia carry the same pressure on the OEM side. Their contracted supply does not cover that ramp.

Korea also chairs FORGE, the allied critical minerals bloc formed at the Critical Minerals Ministerial in February 2026, which coordinates reference pricing and decides which projects receive allied investment. Korean strategic buyers and Korean backed private equity are actively hunting upstream exposure to U.S. critical minerals infrastructure, and that ties directly into the shipbuilding and logistics commitments already on the table from the trade framework.

A sovereign U.S. supply of nickel, cobalt, and manganese is a fundamentally different asset than a partnership with an Indonesian or Congolese source. The downstream commercial infrastructure, processing, refining, offtake, does not yet exist. Which means the partnership window opens now, not when production begins.

Who This Is Built For

The American Samoa Economic Development Council is not looking for one savior check. It is looking for the right counterparties in four categories.

•    Strategic investors and infrastructure funds seeking hard asset exposure to U.S. flagged critical minerals with federal policy behind them.

•    Refiners and processors, including Korean and Japanese groups with existing battery and magnet capability, who need compliant feedstock before the 2027 restrictions bite.

•    End users. Automakers, defense primes, magnet producers, and the AI data center operators now competing for the same nickel, manganese, and copper units.

•    Marine and offshore operators with nodule collection, survey, and vessel capability looking to take a lease position ahead of the fall sale.

What Bridging Culture Worldwide Brings

I have been working on this opportunity since the 2024 Memorandum of Understanding between ASEDC and Critical Mineral Ventures. In March 2026, BCW expanded that role to investor advisory, bringing our full network behind the effort. The mission has not changed. Help American Samoa realize its potential as a strategic supplier of battery grade critical minerals.

•    Investor positioning. Turning a resource story into a diligence ready case that institutional capital and corporate development teams can act on.

•    Korea and Asia market entry. Twenty plus years inside Korean corporate structures, which is where a large share of the refining, battery, and processing capability sits.

•    Partner identification and introduction. Matching operators, offtakers, and capital to the specific link in the chain they can own.

•    Compliance and program navigation. Sourcing rules, Department of Energy and defense battery programs, and the FORGE and Project Vault layer now sitting on top of them.

•    Government and community bridge work. Keeping federal process, territorial government, and fa’a Samoa aligned so a deal survives contact with the ground.

The Ask

If your company is evaluating a lease position, a refining footprint, an offtake agreement, or an equity stake in American Samoa, I want the conversation before the fall lease sale rather than after it.

I am also taking a limited number of advisory engagements this cycle for companies that need a partner on critical minerals strategy, Korea and Asia positioning, or Pacific market entry.

Reach me directly. Don Southerton, 310-866-3777, dsoutherton@bridgingculture.com, Golden, Colorado.

 

 

About the American Samoa Economic Development Council

ASEDC is dedicated to promoting sustainable economic growth in American Samoa through opportunities in seabed critical minerals, including processing, refining, and related industries. John Wasko, Executive Director. americansamoaedc1@gmail.com. (684) 733-0833.

About Bridging Culture Worldwide

BCW is a Korea and U.S. business intelligence firm specializing in market entry, investor positioning, and strategic partnerships across automotive, technology, and critical materials. www.bridgingculture.com