President Donald Trump’s renewed interest in acquiring Greenland has once again thrust the world’s largest island into the centre of global geopolitical speculation. Framed publicly as a strategic economic and security initiative, the proposal rests heavily on the belief that Greenland’s vast mineral wealth, particularly its rare earth elements, could be unlocked to counter China’s dominance in global critical mineral supply chains.
Yet beyond the headlines and political theatre lies a far more complex reality. Greenland’s geology may be rich, but its legal status, environmental conditions, infrastructure limitations and international obligations make large scale mining not merely difficult, but structurally improbable for decades to come. Even if the United States were somehow to obtain sovereignty over the territory, an outcome that Denmark has categorically rejected, the legal and practical barriers to resource extraction would remain formidable.
This is not merely a story of ice and isolation. It is a story of constitutional law, Indigenous self determination, international environmental regulation, Arctic governance, strategic competition between great powers and the slow machinery of modern mining regulation.
Greenland possesses significant deposits of rare earth elements, a group of seventeen metals including neodymium and terbium that are essential for smartphones, televisions, wind turbines, electric vehicles and advanced military systems. As the BBC has reported, modern consumer electronics would not function without them.
Tony Sage, chief executive of Critical Metals, told the BBC that China currently controls the world’s supply of these materials and that Greenland could offer a strategic alternative. Reuters has also documented substantial occurrences of graphite and graphite schist across the island, alongside deposits of diamonds, gold, nickel, titanium, tungsten and zinc as identified by Greenland’s Mineral Resources Authority.
On paper, this mineral catalogue is impressive. In reality, it exists within one of the most legally protected, environmentally fragile and logistically inaccessible territories on Earth.
Sovereignty and the legal impossibility of acquisition
Greenland is an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark. Its status is governed by the Greenland Self Government Act of 2009, which transferred authority over mineral resources, environmental regulation and industrial licensing to the Government of Greenland.
Any transfer of sovereignty would require not only the consent of Denmark’s parliament but also the approval of the Greenlandic population through democratic processes consistent with international law, including the right to self determination under Article 1 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the United Nations Charter.
There exists no legal mechanism under contemporary international law for a state to acquire territory by purchase or political pressure alone. Any attempt by the United States to assert control without lawful consent would constitute a violation of the prohibition on territorial acquisition by coercion, a cornerstone principle established after the Second World War and reaffirmed in United Nations General Assembly resolutions and International Court of Justice jurisprudence.
Denmark’s opposition is therefore not symbolic. It is legally decisive.
Even assuming a hypothetical and lawful change in sovereignty, Greenland’s environment itself creates obstacles that modern mining law cannot simply override.
CNN has reported that most mineral deposits are located in remote regions above the Arctic Circle, beneath or near a polar ice sheet more than a mile thick. Roughly eighty percent of Greenland is covered by ice. For much of the year, darkness dominates, temperatures fall well below operational thresholds for heavy industry, and sea access is blocked by ice.
Mining in the Arctic is estimated to be five to ten times more expensive than elsewhere in the world. This is not merely an engineering issue but a legal one.
Under Greenlandic law, mining companies must submit comprehensive environmental and social impact assessments, financial guarantees for site rehabilitation, emergency response plans and long term waste management strategies before receiving an exploitation licence. These requirements mirror standards found in European Union environmental law, the Espoo Convention on transboundary environmental impact assessment and the Aarhus Convention on public participation in environmental decision making.
Extreme weather multiplies the cost of meeting these legal obligations.
The Associated Press has reported that most mining projects in Greenland have not advanced beyond the exploratory stage. Even in the populated south, there are few roads and no railways. Diogo Rosa of the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland has explained that any mining venture would need to construct its own transport networks from scratch.
From a legal standpoint, this introduces layers of additional approvals. Road construction, port development, air transport corridors and power generation facilities each require separate environmental licences, community consultations and compliance with land use laws controlled by the Greenlandic parliament.
Power supply presents another structural problem. Many potential mining areas lack reliable electricity, requiring diesel generators or new energy infrastructure, each triggering further regulatory scrutiny.
Greenland’s only mine and the reality of Arctic logistics
Business Insider has documented that Greenland currently has only one fully operational mine, producing anorthosite. It is located deep within a fjord system with no road access. Supplies and workers arrive by ship during ice free months or by helicopter during winter when the fjord freezes.
Naaja Nathanielsen, Greenland’s minister responsible for natural resources, stated that developing a mine takes on average sixteen years from concept to production.
This timeline reflects modern regulatory reality. It encompasses geological surveys, public consultations, environmental assessments, financing negotiations, court challenges, infrastructure development and compliance audits. These procedures exist precisely to prevent ecological disasters and social harm.
They cannot be waived by political ambition.
Greenland’s population is predominantly Inuit. Their rights are protected under domestic law and international instruments including the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
This declaration requires free, prior and informed consent before major resource extraction projects proceed on Indigenous land. Although not a treaty, it has become a powerful normative standard cited by courts and investors alike.
Failure to obtain meaningful consent exposes mining companies and host governments to litigation, reputational damage and financing collapse. In the modern investment environment, no major financial institution will support projects that violate Indigenous rights standards without risking sanctions and exclusion from capital markets.
Mining in Greenland also collides with global climate commitments.
Denmark is bound by the Paris Agreement, European climate targets and domestic climate legislation. Greenland’s ice sheet is one of the most critical stabilising components of the global climate system. Any large scale industrial activity in proximity to it is subject to intense scientific scrutiny.
Environmental damage in Greenland would have transboundary effects, potentially engaging state responsibility under international environmental law, including the duty to prevent significant harm to other states.
This alone makes rapid industrial exploitation politically radioactive in European diplomacy.
Lukas Slothuus of the University of Sussex told The Conversation that the Trump administration seeks to dominate the Arctic to counter Russia and China.
This objective intersects with military strategy, shipping routes and resource security. However, it also triggers legal regimes governing the Arctic, including the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the Arctic Council framework and bilateral treaties concerning continental shelf boundaries.
Mining projects would become geopolitical flashpoints, subject to scrutiny by rival powers and international institutions.
The Denmark Greenland profit sharing agreement
Any mining profits in Greenland are subject to a formal profit sharing arrangement with Denmark. This agreement forms part of Greenland’s fiscal autonomy framework and ensures that revenues reduce Danish subsidies gradually.
Foreign control over Greenlandic resources would therefore reverberate directly in Copenhagen, altering budgetary relations and constitutional arrangements.
This alone ensures that Denmark would contest any external attempt to dominate Greenland’s resource sector through every legal and diplomatic channel available.
The uncomfortable truth behind the Arctic narrative
The reality is that Greenland’s minerals are not locked away by politics alone. They are constrained by law, climate, geography, infrastructure absence, Indigenous rights and international environmental commitments.
The notion that a change of flag would unlock a mineral treasure trove misunderstands the structure of twenty first century resource extraction. Sovereignty no longer grants unchecked exploitation powers. Mining today is governed by dense networks of domestic law, international treaties, investor compliance standards and environmental obligations.
Even under United States jurisdiction, these constraints would remain.
Greenland’s resources exist in geological abundance but legal scarcity.
They lie beneath ice, regulatory frameworks, international treaties, Indigenous rights protections and infrastructure voids that no executive order or political declaration can bypass.
President Trump’s interest highlights the strategic value of critical minerals in an era of technological rivalry. But it also exposes a deeper reality. The age when territory could be acquired and stripped of resources by political will alone has ended.
In Greenland, the cold is not merely physical. It is legal, institutional and structural.
And for any power seeking to mine its riches, that cold may prove impossible to overcome.