Chinese lithium must not become 'new Russian gas', EU industry chief says

The European Commission has drawn up a list of 47 priority mining and processing projects it wants to bring into operation by the end of the decade, amid a growing global scramble for essential elements such as lithium, cobalt, copper and rare earth metals.

"We don't want to replace our dependence on fossil fuels with a dependence on raw materials," the Commission's vice-president in charge of industrial strategy told reporters in Brussels Stéphane Séjourné. "Chinese lithium will not be tomorrow's Russian gas."

The French commissioner alluded to the Kremlin's weaponisation of much of Europe's natural gas supply in the run-up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and to China's position as a leading supplier of many essential elements, including almost all rare earths imported into the EU.

Lithium - a key component of batteries for electric vehicles - is just one of 34 raw materials identified by the EU as key to the transition from fossil fuels to clean energy and the new digital economy, half of which Brussels considers strategically important.

The EU list - which can be viewed on an interactive map - includes industrial lithium mining or processing projects in Portugal, Spain, France, Germany, the Czech Republic and Finland. In total, the projects are spread across 13 Member States.

Lithium and cobalt on the way

Under the Critical Raw Materials Act, adopted a year ago, governments have committed to ensuring that 10 % of mineral extraction, 40 % of mineral processing and 25 % of recycling take place in the EU by the end of the decade.

The Commission said the bloc will fully meet these targets for lithium and cobalt if the projects - selected on the basis of maturity and viability - are implemented, while making "significant progress" on graphite, nickel and manganese.

The Act calls on EU Member States to provide for simplified permitting of selected projects within 27 months for mining companies and 15 months for processing and recycling facilities.

The Commission's newly created Critical Raw Materials Council will work with interested companies to leverage the estimated €22.5 billion in capital investment that will be needed, for example by facilitating financing through development banks.

The Board of Directors of the European Investment Bank last week agreed to launch a new Strategic Initiative for Critical Raw Materials, which will make €2 billion available for investment financing this year alone.

Of the 170 applications for inclusion among the EU's strategic projects, 46 came from outside the EU and will be decided in the coming weeks after further negotiations, which Séjourné admitted will have a political dimension.

However, the Commission Vice-President denied that the US moves to signal interest in critical raw materials in Greenland, Ukraine and even Canada were driving the EU's raw materials policy, which has been gaining momentum for several years.

"On the other hand, there's probably a level of urgency and speed that didn't exist three or four months ago in trade relations and geopolitical tensions that we have to take into account," He said.

Trump takes action

The urgency is clearly felt on the other side of the Atlantic as well. The President of the United States Donald Trump announced last Thursday in an executive order "immediate action to increase U.S. mineral production", which similarly seek to shorten permitting deadlines while making them a matter of defence and energy security.

However, not all observers are satisfied with the pace of Brussels' progress. Robin Roels, coordinator of the EU Raw Materials Coalition, a coalition of environmental NGOs, warned that the Commission risks undermining public trust through an "opaque" tender process.

"If the EU is serious about a fair and sustainable transition, it must open up the process to real scrutiny and ensure that the voices of the community are heard," He said. "Despite repeated requests, the full list of project applicants and evaluation criteria remains unpublished."

The Commission is clearly aware that public opposition to mining projects - which has hampered efforts to develop lithium mining in Portugal and Serbia, to cite just two recent examples - will need to be overcome if the EU is to achieve its 2030 targets.

"Mining in Europe will also mean political work on the social acceptability of these projects," Séjourné said, stressing that national and European interests must be emphasised.

euronews/ gnews.cz - RoZ

Photo by Vardan Papikyan on Unsplash