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In another indication that awareness of the acuteness of our nation’s critical mineral woes has gone mainstream in recent months, the Washington Post’s editorial board weighed in with some thoughts on how to curb the risks associated with U.S. over-reliance on Chinese minerals.

In a new opinion piece published last week, editors argue that while the environmental benefits of the United States’ green energy shift stand to be significant, the geopolitical risks are not to be dismissed – particularly as China dominates key segments of the critical minerals supply chain for many of the materials underpinning clean energy technology.

To minimize reliance on China, the editorial board suggests that stakeholders should “keep calm” and work towards mitigating possible supply shocks by strengthening stockpiling and recycling efforts.    Marking an important shift in the public discourse, which long been rife with hesitation to embrace increased domestic resource development, the Washington Post editors call for a strengthened commitment to U.S.-based mining and mineral processing to reduce geopolitical risk while also demanding permitting reforms to accelerate and update the permitting “red tape.” 

Followers of ARPN well know that the most prudent approach mineral resource security is a comprehensive all-of-the above approach – one that strengthens domestic capacities along all segments of the supply chain while leveraging partnerships with friendly nations.   The Washington Post editors agree – arguing that further friend-shoring deals along the lines of those ARPN has regularly discussed on our blog (see for example here, here and here) could “create and coordinate a free flow of critical minerals among like-minded countries.” 

The authors further invoke a new Aspen Institute task force report which suggests that clarifying standards for prior consultation with tribal nations could help resolve many concerns surrounding domestic resource development, which is preferrable to relying on countries with poor labor and environmental standards.

As the editorial board states:

“Environmentalists should remember: The question is not whether mining will occur but where. If not under regulated conditions in this country, it could well be in places such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, the world’s leading cobalt source. Though companies there have cleaned up their acts recently, working conditions remain poor, and a significant minority of the substance still comes from artisanal mines, often dug by children.”

We hear a great deal about concerning ourselves with our carbon footprint.  Perhaps it’s time to focus on the human rights footprint of the metals and minerals that make our modern world work.

 

As world leaders continue to deliberate on the new realities of the post-Cold War world order in Davos this week,  ARPN takes a second look at the realignment underway in the minerals sector.  In this post, we shift our focus to the West, where the “Three Amigos Summit,” as the trilateral North American Leaders’ Summit between the prime minister of Canada, the president of Mexico, and the president of the United States is sometimes called, made some headlines directly relevant to critical minerals issues.

Leading up to the event, the three countries announced fresh commitments to work together on key sectors, such as semiconductors and critical minerals, as well as on supply chains and advanced workforce training.   As ABC News reports, “those agreements include a cabinet-level summit on semiconductors, mapping mineral resources across the North American continent and promoting educational investment.”

The United States lists a number of countries as strategic partners in its quest to achieve greater “supply chain resilience.”   However, the Three Amigos’ commitments must be viewed in the context of the overall U.S. goal of establishing a more integrated North American supply chain with Canada and Mexico being not only the largest trading partners, but also the only ones with whom the U.S. shares national borders.

Canada and the United States have already taken their own steps to advance critical mineral supply chain security and decouple from adversary nations, i.e. China, deepened their cooperation bilaterally over the past few years, with a flurry of activities occurring over the past twelve months. Followers of ARPN will recall the invocation of the Defense Production Act and the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act. (see our Year in Review post for more).

For Canada, 2022 culminated in the launch of the country’s Critical Minerals Strategy in December 2022, with a stated goal of speeding up the permitting process for new mines in Canada after Ottawa cracked down on Chinese investment into the country’s critical mineral sector in the wake of growing national security concerns.  In line with these policies, the Canadian federal government has just greenlighted Canadian miner Galaxy Lithium Inc.’s project to construct a new lithium mine in Quebec.

To our south, Mexico, home to significant copper and silver deposits, is also known to have significant rare earths and lithium deposits.  While observers point out that a confluence of technological, legal and political challenges will likely continue to hamper critical mineral resource development leaving Mexico to “continue to assemble electric cars but not provide the materials for many of the key components required for a greener future,” closer cooperation between the Three Amigos in this area is welcome and likely beneficial in the long run, if Mexico is able to address some of its domestic obstacles.

Leaving North America behind, another key U.S. partner, Australia, is forging ahead with its push to strengthen critical mineral supply chains for its own industries and for the benefit of its partners. Earlier this week, the federal government in Canberra released guidelines for “new grants to help develop Australia’s critical minerals sector, support downstream processing, create jobs across regional Australia and support global efforts to achieve net-zero.”

Across the Atlantic, the European Union in September of 2022 proposed European Critical Raw Material Act, which aims to boost domestic critical minerals production, diversify supply chains and ramp up recycling efforts and which is scheduled to be released in the first quarter of 2023.

In a broader global context, the United States, Australia, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Japan, Korea, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the European Union have banded together to form the Minerals Security Partnership, an initiative to bolster critical mineral supply chains while ensuring that “critical minerals are produced, processed and recycled in a manner that supports the ability of countries to realize the full economic development benefit of their geological endowments” (see our post on the launch here).

Formation of the MSP, in the words of Reuters’s Andy Home, may signify a “tectonic realignment with far-reaching implications” as it — against the backdrop of Russia’s war on Ukraine and mounting tension with China — is “defined as much as anything by who is not on the invite list — China and Russia,” and likened it to the creation of a “metallic NATO (…) though no-one [was] calling it that just yet.”

While “the shape of an alternative international system is unclear,” as the New York Times posited earlier this week in a piece on a newly emerging post-Cold War world order, it appears that the great realignment has begun, and we can expect to see more developments along these lines in the coming months.

  2022 surely was as fast-paced a year as they come. Didn’t we just throw overboard our New Year’s Resolutions?  We blinked, and it’s time for another review of what has happened in the past twelve months. So with no further ado, here is ARPN’s annual attempt to take stock of what has happened on the [...]

Against the backdrop of mounting geopolitical and ongoing supply chain challenges, countries are left grappling with the the mineral intensity of the sought-after global transition towards a net zero carbon emissions future. In their quest to untangle complex critical mineral supply chains and reduce over-reliance on adversary nations, the extent of which was first brought [...]

With global pressures on supply chains continuing to mount, the United States and allied countries announced the formation of a new initiative to bolster critical mineral supplies during last month’s Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada convention. The Minerals Security Partnership (MSP) comprises the United States, Canada, Australia, Finland, France, Germany, Japan, the Republic of [...]