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“December 6 is National Miners Day… a fitting time to reflect on how much miners provide to allow for our modern way of life. (…)”  

You might not recognize how mining plays a role in your daily life. Most people do not see the raw materials produced by mining, from metals and minerals to coal and stone, sand, and gravel. Instead, we use items every day that come from mined raw materials, never knowing that mining played an integral part in the development of the mobile devices we use, the roads we travel on, the cookware we use to make our meals, and the mined fertilizers that helped grow our food. These products, in addition to countless other necessities and conveniences, start with mining.”

This is not an excerpt from a puff piece written by a trade association – it’s a snippet from the CDC website today, and many other U.S. government agencies, as well as Members of Congress have put out similar statements acknowledging the mining industry’s contributions to our modern way of life.

Since 2009, when National Miners Day was first proclaimed by Congress to be observed every December 6, awareness of the importance of metals and minerals, and securing their supply chains, has steadily grown.

Fueled by a global pandemic severing supply chains and compounded by mounting environmental and geopolitical pressures, and the realization that our green energy future will be mineral intensive, critical mineral supply chain security today is more than a buzz word, and stakeholders understand the need to — responsibly and sustainably — mine and process the metals and minerals that underpin the global push towards net zero carbon emissions and 21^stCentury technology in the broader sense.

Thankfully, the mining industry is ready to meet the challenge and is not only upping the ante on the ESG front in general, but is specifically leveraging the materials science revolution to sustainably develop and process the metals and minerals we need today and in the future.

In recent years, ARPN has been showcasing initiatives by mining companies to sustainably green the future, ranging from overhauling supply chain policies to ensure suppliers conform to certain environmental and social standards to incorporating renewable power sources into their operations to offset some of the carbon costs for resource development.

Perhaps most recently, in November of 2022, mining equipment manufacturer Caterpillar announced a successful demonstration of its first battery electric large mining truck, going hand in hand with a “significant investment to transform its Arizona-based proving ground into a sustainable testing and validation hub of the future.”

Many more initiatives are underway (several are featured here and here), and we will continue to feature them going forward.

As the global push towards net zero carbon emissions accelerates, the understanding that critical minerals hold the key to achieving climate goals has grown.   With EV battery technology at the heart of the green energy transition, the “Battery Criticals” (lithium, cobalt, nickel, graphite and manganese) have entered the spotlight.   While initially the main focus was on the cathode materials lithium, cobalt and nickel, the realization that graphite might be equally, if not more critical has set in — for good reason.

As the key raw material in the battery anode, graphite is the largest component of lithium-ion batteries by weight. In light of “phenomenal demand growth from the EV battery sector and delays to new capacity as well as rising power costs,” the graphite supply chain represents a significant and growing challenge for automakers looking to reduce the carbon footprint of the materials they use for their EVs.

As Fastmarkets consultant Amy Bennett outlines, unlike natural graphite, which is mined and then processed for usage in the battery industry, synthetic graphite utilizes a carbon precursor product – i.e. petroleum coke, needle coke or coal tar pitch – which is then made into graphite via a process called graphitization.

Most graphite production currently takes place in China. A majority of batteries to date use a blend of natural and synthetic graphite, but there may be compelling reasons for a shift towards natural graphite as long as supply chain security can be established.

Arguing that both supply chains have “multiple environmental, social and governance (ESG) concerns, with natural graphite subject to the risks of an ongoing conflict in northern Mozambique that started in 2017,” our friends at Benchmark Mineral Intelligence have taken a closer look how both graphite materials compare, and find that “[t]the production of natural graphite anodes is around 55% less carbon intensive than the average synthetic graphite anode produced in China.”

They add:

“For natural graphite, two-thirds of the carbon emissions come from the spheroidisation process, for which China currently has a monopoly. Spheroidisation is the process in which flake graphite particles are mechanically rounded. This leads to the loss of some material, but yields improvements in the performance of the anode.”

However, while the production of natural graphite is associated with fewer carbon emissions, Benchmark sees its global supply chain remaining fragile, particularly as Mozambique, a major source of natural graphite outside of China, experiences an  ISIS-affiliated terror threat in its northern Cabo Delgado province, from where much of the country’s graphite is sourced.

Looking towards Europe, where almost 70% of natural graphite has been mined in Russia and Ukraine, Moscow’s ongoing war on Ukraine could seriously destabilize the region’s graphite production.

Meanwhile mining in Madagascar, which currently accounts for roughly 10% of global supply is threatened by severe climate events in the form of cyclones.  Finally, there is some phantom natural graphite produced in North Korea, and likely moved into the global supply chain via China – no one’s idea of a socially-responsible source of battery material.

Currently, according to the USGS, the United States is 100% import dependent for its graphite needs, but as ARPN recently pointed out,

“that’s not for lack of known graphite resources.  As USGS noted in February 2022 in its updated U.S. Mineral Deposit Database, Graphite One’s Graphite Creek deposit near Nome, Alaska is America’s largest graphite deposit.  If U.S. Government efforts to develop an American-based EV and lithium-ion battery supply chain have any hope of succeeding, looking for ways to help projects like Graphite Creek down the path to production will be, in a word…. Critical.”

Until then, China’s battery anode dominance could be the West’s Achilles heel in the green energy transition – in defense planners parlance, a potential “single point of failure”:  irrespective of whether we succeed in developing multiple minerals and metals for the battery cathode, if we are unable to meet anode material needs – and we cannot do so sustainably and ESG-friendly without natural graphite — we will not be able to build a rechargeable battery independent of China.

As ARPN outlined:

“The sourcing provisions in the energy passages of the recently passed Inflation Reduction Act, coupled with the recently announced grants to ‘supercharge’ U.S. EV battery and electric grid supply chains are important steps towards mitigating that potential single point of failure.  However, considering the long timelines for permitting for mining and processing projects, decoupling and building out a battery supply chain independent of China will warrant a concerted effort by stakeholders and policy makers to decouple from China.”

As geopolitical tensions continue to mount and supply chain challenges loom large across many sectors, Beijing is tightening reins on its critical mineral supply chains. According to news reports, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology announced plans to increase its supervision of China’s lithium battery supply chain, which, according to the ministry, is “severely unbalanced.” [...]

In recent months, and in particular in the wake of the recently-passed congressional Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), we have seen a long overdue uptick in efforts to build out a secure North American critical minerals supply chain. Not surprisingly, many of these efforts are focused on what ARPN has dubbed the “super-criticals” – the five battery materials, plus [...]

The energy provisions in the recently passed congressional Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) are beginning to bear fruit.  Standing to get $35 million in government subsidies for every gigagwatt-hour of cell storage capacity produced, battery suppliers are stepping up their efforts in the United States. As the Wall Street Journal reports, Norwegian battery maker Freyr and energy conglomerate [...]

Within days of Canada outlining new investment stipulations for state-owned entities aimed at protecting the country’s critical minerals sector, the Canadian government last week told three Chinese resource companies to divest their interests in Canadian critical mineral firms. Basing the decision on “facts and evidence and on the advice of critical minerals subject matter experts, Canada’s [...]

We’re “on a highway to climate hell.” The picture UN Secretary General Antonio Gutierrez is painting of current efforts in the climate fight is – expectedly – bleak. As such, it is no surprise that nations have been doubling down on their efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and the Biden Administration is no exception. Followers of ARPN have [...]

As global leaders direct their focus towards the COP27 climate change summit kicking off in Sharm El Sheikh this upcoming Sunday, pressures on critical mineral supply chains – particularly those for the “battery criticals”underpinning EV battery and energy storage technology — continue to mount. While for some time, much of the “battery critical” focus was primarily on lithium, [...]

It’s Halloween – time for trick or treating, spooky storytelling and scary visuals.  Here’s a real scary one if you’re still looking to frighten the policy wonks among your Halloween party guests. Courtesy of our friends at Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, it’s an infographic that should send a serious chill down policy makers’ spines, and it’s not even gory: While [...]

With pressures rising on critical mineral supply chains as nations rush to flesh out environmental initiatives before the COP27 climate change summit kicks off in Sharm El Sheikh next month, the stakes for the United States and its allies to “decouple” from adversary nations — in the new U.S. National Security Strategy, read:  China — may have gotten even [...]