Less flashy and headline-grabbing than some of its tech metal peers, this mainstay mineral deserves far more credit and attention than it is currently getting.  Followers of ARPN will know that we have long touted the versatility, stemming from its traditional uses, new applications and Gateway Metal status.

Copper is also an irreplaceable component for advanced energy technology, ranging from EVs over wind turbines and solar panels to the electric grid.   The manufacturing process for EVs requires four times more Copper than gas powered vehicles, and the expansion of electricity networks will lead to more than doubled Copper demand for grid lines, according to the IEA.

A recent graphic by Visual Capitalist depicts the Copper intensity of the energy transition with a view towards solar and onshore and offshore wind energy technology:

Add in Copper’s Gateway Metal status — the processing of the metal yields access to a host of co-products essential to “manufacturing the advanced technologies that will power our economy for generations to come”  such as Cobalt, Tellurium, Molybdenum, Rhenium, Arsenic and REEs  — and a 2019 mining executive’s projection that “[t]he world will need the same amount of copper over the next 25 years that it has produced in the past 500 years if it is to meet global demand.

Recent developments in Washington, D.C. — movement on a bipartisan infrastructure package and announcements of new EV goals and fuel efficiency standards — will only add to the outlined Copper demand scenarios.

And the challenge is not just mining, but also processing, as Laura Skaer, a member of the board of directors of the Women’s Mining Coalition and former director of the American Exploration & Mining Association, outlined in a recent piece for Morning Consult:

“Last year, the United States imported 37 percent of the copper we used. China already refines 50 percent of the world’s copper and the United States only refines about 3 percent. National security experts have warned that relying on China for critical supply-chain materials like refined copper poses a serious threat to America’s national security interests.”

The United States Government failed in 2018 to include Copper in its official Critical Minerals list, a faux pas the Canadian government did not commit with the release of its own Critical Minerals list earlier this year, which included Copper along with fellow key Gateway Metals Nickel and Zinc in its list of 31.

Meanwhile, the Biden Administration’s 100-Day Supply Chain Review highlights Copper as an integral component of Lithium-ion battery technology, in the context of being what we have called a “gateway metal” to other critical materials, and for its “use across many end-use applications aside from lithium-ion cells, including building construction, electrical and electronic products, transportation equipment, consumer and general products, and industrial machinery and equipment.” 

Here’s hoping that the greater prominence given to Copper — both as a standalone material and Gateway Metal — by the White House 100-day report is an indication that a forthcoming updated U.S. Critical Minerals List will acknowledge the metal’s ever-growing importance.  Until then, Copper will remain one of the most “Critical Non-Criticals,” as we note in ARPN’s recent report, Critical Mass.

The post The Mineral Intensity of a Carbon-Neutral Future – A Look at Copper appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

The leases granted to Twin Metals Minnesota LLC over heavy opposition from environmentalist groups, were first issued in 1966 for a 20-year term, and renewed several times.  The Obama administration had rejected the latest renewals in 2016, but officials in the current administration questioned the government’s legal power to reject the renewal and thus reversed this decision.

It’s a timely move: formally a copper/nickel/gold/platinum-palladium deposit – the project site has Critical Mineral potential via the Platinum Group Metals, at a time when critical mineral and metal co-products factor into the U.S. Government’s focus on alleviating critical mineral import-dependencies.

Minnesota Congressmen Emmer (MN-06) and Congressman Pete Stauber (MN-08) applauded the signing of the leases.

Said Congressman Emmer: 

“Following the Interior’s announcement today, I am pleased that the Trump Administration acknowledges that we can responsibly develop our state’s resources – bringing jobs back to this region – while preserving the forests, lakes and streams that all Minnesotans hold dear,” said Congressman Emmer. “Our state and local economies deserve to prosper, and we can ensure that, while also protecting Minnesota’s beauty for future generations. When it comes to protecting the environment and developing our economic assets, nobody does it better than Minnesota.”

Congressman Stauber added: 

“In northern Minnesota, mining is our past, our present, and our future. With 21st century technology, we can responsibly develop the resources needed for the modern world and unleash the economic engine of northeastern Minnesota. (…) Unfortunately, misinformed policies of the past have not only prevented the responsible development of our resources but have even prohibited companies like Twin Metals from even submitting a proposed mining plan. I applaud Secretary Bernhardt and the Trump Administration for putting politics aside and rightfully giving our miners the opportunity to meet or exceed all environmental standards.”

The BLM’s Environmental Assessment released in December of 2018 includes updated language to ensure compliance with laws and regulations that have been put in place since the leases were initially granted. 

With the leases renewed, the permitting process will move into the next phase, during which Twin Metals must submit formal mine plan of operations triggering an extensive scientific and environmental review by the federal government.  

With copper increasingly becoming a key building block of not just mainstay industries but also our green energy future, this is a welcome development we will continue to follow. 

The post DoI Grants Hardrock Mineral Lease Renewals in Superior National Forest in Minnesota appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

Citing ARPN’s Dan McGroarty, Earth Magazine contributor Veronica Tuazon zeroes in on this omission in a recent piece for the American Geosciences Institute’s monthly publication.

“Copper is essential in electrical wiring and transportation and is playing an increasingly large role in alternative energy, as it is a crucial component in wind turbines, solar panels and electric vehicles, which require four times as much copper as conventional gas vehicles. But it is also the gateway to several elements on the critical list that are produced as a byproduct of copper mining, as Daniel McGroarty of the American Resources Policy Network, a virtual think tank focused on resource development, pointed out in a series of comments submitted about the DOI’s draft critical minerals list. He also noted that zinc, nickel and lead should be included on the list for the same reason. McGroarty argued that copper is of the highest priority because it ‘is the practical access point to at least four minerals on the DOI List,’ referring to cobalt, rhenium, tellurium and, potentially, the rare earths.”

Tuazon points out that while USGS, which worked with DoI to put together the list of 35, acknowledged the “co-production issue,” Copper was excluded from the list because the risk of supply disruptions for Copper was considered “very low,” according to Steven Fortier, director of the USGS National Minerals Information Center.

However, says Tuazon:

“[W]ith rapid technological advancement and growth, what actually is and isn’t critical changes over time and often eludes simple categorizations. Or as McGroarty puts it, ‘as technology changes, what was once considered minor can have major impacts.’ For example, there was virtually no demand for strontium in the United States before the 1960s, when it was suddenly needed in relatively large quantities to reduce radiation emitted by early televisions.”

While the United States’ net import reliance for copper may currently be pegged at 34 percent it should be noted that we also have a 600,000 MT copper gap each year – the gap between what we consume and what we produce.

Against the backdrop of Copper’s growing list of applications and increased usage in one of the key growth markets – EV battery technology (as visualized here) – analysts anticipate Copper consumption to greatly “outstrip supply as it is slated to increase more than six times.”

On a global scale, with over 200 currently-operating Copper mines slated to reach the end of their production cycle before 2035, CRU analyst Hamish Sampson estimated in the spring of 2018 that “unless new investments arise, existing copper mine production will drop from 20 million tonnes to below 12 million tonnes by 2034, leading to a supply shortfall of more than 15 million tonnes.”

Sampson argued that only if “every single copper project currently in development or being studied for feasibility is brought online before then, including most discoveries that have not yet reached the evaluation stage, the market could meet projected demand.”

With a lack of mega-projects coming on stream before the mid-2020s and global production for Copper expected to peak by the second half of 2019 one thing is clear: Whether or not Copper (and its fellow gateway metals) is excluded from the list of 35 critical minerals — It cannot be excluded from policy considerations in 2019.

The post Copper and the 2018 Critical Minerals List – Considerations for Resource Policy Reform appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

Speakers for the event, which discussed “efforts to gather information and develop tools that can be used to ensure a secure national and global supply of mineral resources, and identify and quantifying vulnerabilities in this supply, among others,” included:

• Nedal Nassar, Chief of the Materials Flow Analysis Section at the USGS’s National Minerals Information Center, and
• Vitor Correia, President of the European Federation of Geologists, and coordinator of the EU’s INTRAW project.

If you missed it, the video and supporting documents are now online:

Of particular interest for ARPN followers, Mr. Nassar, who authored a study on the issue of what he and his co-author Prof. Thomas Graedel called “byproduct metals” in 2015,  also highlighted the crucial nature and inter-relationship between Gateway Metals and their Co-Products.

The video and slides serve as a great resource for stakeholders looking to engage in the national policy discourse over the formulation of a federal action plan to implement the recent executive order on critical minerals.

The post ICYMI – Video and Supporting Documents for AGI Webinar on “Tracking the Global Supply of Critical Materials” appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

In October of last year, the Department of Energy’s Critical Materials Institute (CMI)  announced it would join forces with global mining and minerals company Rio Tinto to study new ways to capture Gateway Metals and Co-products that are increasingly becoming indispensable in clean power manufacturing.

As Ames Lab described the project last year,

“the new initiative aims to ensure that the United States fully leverages domestic mineral and metal resources necessary for global leadership in clean energy manufacturing.

The Rio Tinto-CMI research partnership will combine Rio Tinto’s operational expertise with CMI’s research capabilities, materials science expertise and computing power.  Focused on the efficient extraction of critical materials from the copper smelting process, the research will have three core work-streams:  

1.            Improving recovery rates of critical minerals and metals (rhenium, selenium, tellurium, scandium, etc.) from samples sourced from Rio Tinto’s operating Kennecott Copper Mine in Utah and the Resolution Copper project currently under regulatory review and permitting in Arizona.

2.            Exploring potential for increasing recovery rates of rare minerals and metals through processing waste tailings.

3.            Examining process improvements that would facilitate the blending of processed electronic waste (‘e-waste’) with copper concentrates to substantially increase the recovery of valuable metals such as gold, copper, silver, platinum, lithium and rare earths present in spent cellphones, computers and solar panels.”

CMI’s collaborations with private sector companies have already proven to be valuable tools in the effort to alleviate supply risks for critical raw materials:

According to a GAO report released last year, as of May 1, 2016 CMI “research projects had already resulted in 42 invention disclosures, 17 patent applications, and 1 licensed technology.” Moreover, two recent CMI technologies developed in the context of ongoing public-private partnerships have been named 2017 R&D 100 Award finalists. The award is presented annually “to the top 100 scientific innovations as selected by independent panel of more than 50 judges representing R&D leaders in a variety of fields.”

As those who have followed ARPN’s “Through the Gateway” informational campaign will know, while demand for Co-Product Metals is increasing, the United States not only has a significant degree of import dependency for many of them, but also for the respective Gateway Metal – all of which has implications for both the United States’ competitiveness and national security.

Against this backdrop, CMI’s research partnership with Rio Tinto is a promising endeavor, tying into the research hub’s overall mandate to address our nation’s critical mineral needs.

The post Materials Science Profiles of Progress: CMI Public-Private Partnership Studies New Ways to Capture Gateway Metals and Critical Co-Products appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

However, as the infographic outlines, it is its application in battery technology that may completely change Nickel’s status going forward. Here, so far, Cobalt and Lithium have been in the spotlight leaving Nickel largely underrated – even though by mass, Nickel already represents the most important component of Lithium-Ion cathodes. In order to increase energy density while reducing raw material costs, analysts expect the overall Nickel content in future battery chemistries to increase even further. 

Meanwhile, as the infographic shows, most Nickel is not high-grade enough for battery production, with less than 10 percent coming in sulfide form, of which not all is battery-grade material. 

From a U.S. perspective, USGS has in recent years revised its Nickel supply assessments, as we outlined last year when we discussed the “metal that brought you cheap flights” in the context of our Gateway Metals informational campaign: 

“While previous year reports showed no domestic reserves for Nickel, reserves today are pegged at 160,000 metric tons – and one active new Nickel mine in Michigan produced 26,500 metric tons of concentrates for export to Canadian and overseas smelters. Our net import reliance for Nickel is 37 percent, and new projects in varying stages of development in Minnesota may further reduce our dependence on foreign supplies of Nickel.”

Since then, our import reliance has dropped even further to 25 percent. 

If demand projections materialize as outlined in the infographic, that is a good thing, though current investments into the Nickel market may not suffice to fully meet demand. 

Time for our policy makers and other stakeholders to add Nickel to their watch list and get serious about devising a comprehensive mineral resource strategy. 

The post Nickel – The “Metal That Brought You Cheap Flights” Now “Secret Driver of the Battery Revolution” appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

We’ve established that the importance of each of the co-products is growing as the revolution in materials science advances. Meanwhile, our import dependence for each of the co-products is significant, and ranges from 58 percent for Palladium to 100 percent for Scandium.

For Nickel, the U.S. domestic supply picture has recently changed, with our import dependence dropping from roughly 50 percent to currently 37 percent with new projects having come online.

Here, too, new uses may increase demand going forward.  We already touched on Nickel’s alloying capabilities, which underscore its versatility and staying power. However, it is its application in battery technology that may become a game changer for the metal’s supply and demand going forward.

In light of across-the-board predictions of higher battery use over the course of the next few years, and in particular in the consumer and electric vehicle segments, analysts see demand for its component metals – including Nickel – soaring.

The bottom line – Gateway Metals not only provide us with access to many co-product metals that underpin modern technology.  They are also important building blocks of the 21^st Century.  With our domestic manufacturers increasingly relying on a stable supply of Gateway Metals and their co-products, the time to devise a comprehensive mineral resource policy framework is now.

The post Through the Gateway: Nickel – Powering Modern Technology appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

A co-product of Tin, we also discussed it in the context of the alloying properties of Gateway Metal Aluminum. It is also a co-product of Nickel.

There is good reason it keeps popping up. For one, while on paper, Scandium resources may in fact be abundant, it is rarely concentrated in nature, making commercially viable deposits extremely rare. Because it is at present largely recovered as a co-product during the processing of various Gateway Metals, including Tin and Nickel, total global production rates are quite low (see our previous post).  Scandium may also be present in certain Copper and Rare Earth deposits.

Enter Scandium’s high tech applications – perhaps most importantly Scalmalloy, the state-of-the-art lightweight aluminum alloy powder with almost the strength of titanium, which perfectly illustrates the ongoing revolution in materials science.

In light of these and other relevant high-tech applications for Scandium, some expect demand to soar as high as by 800% over the next decade. Unsurprisingly, several mining companies – most recently in Russia and Australia – have thrown their hats into the ring, and are looking to go into the business of primary Scandium recovery.  In the U.S., which is currently 100% import dependent to meet our domestic Scandium needs and has to rely on Kazakhstan, and Russia, developers of multi-metallic deposits are also studying the inclusion of scandium recovery into their project plans.

A key challenge – as we have frequently lamented - lies in the fact that resource development cannot happen overnight, especially in a regulatory environment that does not encourage the harnessing of our domestic resource potential.

How the new projects coming online will affect supply and demand remains to be seen, particularly as the materials science revolution continues to yield new research breakthroughs and applications for tech metals.  However, the bottom line is – if Scandium is not yet on your radar, it needs to be.

As we previously pointed out: 

[T]he question is whether U.S. scandium dependency will deepen — or whether U.S. policymakers will understand that resource development policy is key to American innovators’ access to another critical metal.

The post Through the Gateway: Scandium Embodies Materials Science Revolution appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

While junior miners developing Cobalt-bearing properties see a great opportunity here, policy makers should also take note.

The post Through the Gateway: Cobalt – A Critical Mineral Under Scrutiny appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

The following is an overview of our “Through the Gateway” informational campaign, in which we outline the importance of Gateway Metals and their Co-Products.

Here, we expand on the findings of our “Gateway Metals and the Foundations of American Technology” report, in which we focused on a group of five “Gateway Metals,” which are not only critical to manufacturing and national security in their own right, but also “unlock” tech metals increasingly important to innovation and technological development.

In the context of our informational campaign, we featured the five Gateway Metals we covered in the report – Aluminum, Copper, Nickel, Tin and Zinc – as well as the tech metals they unlock, and discussed some of the cutting edge uses for these tech metals, as well as supply and other issues surrounding them.

We are continuing our discussion of Nickel and its co-products, and will update this list as we go.

The post Through The Gateway: A Look at Gateway Metals, Co-Products and the Foundations of American Technology appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.