KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Sep 20 (IPS) – Growing and changing material needs for new technologies have led to a competition for strategic minerals with natural resources, creating dangerous rivalries in the global South.
Looks for resources
Jayati Ghosh, Shouvik Chakraborty and Debamanyu Das have analyzed this new competition for mineral resources in developing countries, brought about by major new innovations since the electronics boom.
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All technologies – both peaceful and military – have specific material requirements. For example, energy transitions require specific minerals for the generation, transmission and storage of renewable energy.
New technologies, with specific material requirements, are changing the nature of the rivalry – between states, companies and individuals – seeking to control these mineral resources.
Feasible mass use of renewable energy requires the necessary natural resources, which entails costs and has negative consequences. Commercial feasibility implies profitable extraction of desired minerals.
Tackling global warming by generating more energy from renewable sources – however desirable and necessary – in turn creates new problems and challenges that need to be addressed.
Rare earths
Despite their name, rare earth elements (REE) may not actually be scarce. But most REE are difficult and expensive to extract because they are usually found together with other minerals. It is not surprising that the demand and supply of REE have changed significantly in recent years.
For the time being, demand for at least seventeen ‘rare earth metals’ is expected to grow. The intergovernmental International Energy Agency (IEA) expects that supplies of some crucial minerals will increase at least thirty-fold over the next twenty years.
Mining lithium and other similar minerals also has very problematic environmental consequences. REE is mined all over the world and is usually processed and separated through several stages of often complex and costly extraction and chemical processing, many of which are harmful to the environment.
China currently leads the world in rare earth production, with more than a third of the world’s known REE reserves. Although Chinese companies dominate some of the supplies, China currently exceeds imports of rare earths.
Nevertheless, China dominates the ‘downstream’ processing of REEs. Chinese companies control more than 85 percent of the costly REE processing processes. Not surprisingly, China is also responsible for more than 70% of the world’s photovoltaic solar panel production and more than 90% of silicon wafer production.
Lithium
Lithium is one of the minerals whose control is hotly contested. Lithium is mainly needed for processes that replace mechanical energy generation using fossil fuels. It is also needed for many industrial, office and home appliances, including rechargeable batteries, electric vehicles and electronic goods.
Batteries – including rechargeable lithium-ion storage devices for electricity grids – are responsible for three-quarters of the electricity supply. The IEA’s Sustainable Development Scenario expects demand to increase 42 times in less than twenty years!
In 2021, there were almost 89 million tonnes of known lithium reserves, mainly in developing countries. For decades, lithium mining has been highly controversial, largely due to its increasingly well-known negative environmental impacts.
Because pure lithium is chemically highly reactive, it is often mined as ore, such as in Western Australia. It is also obtained from salt flats and brine pools in the southern cone of South America, especially in Bolivia, Chile and Argentina.
For decades, China has led the world in lithium mining. Australia and the US were in second and third place at the start of the pandemic, with 12% and 9% respectively. While Australia is the world’s largest exporter, lithium is mainly and increasingly extracted by relatively few companies in developing countries.
Undermining communities
REE mining has negatively impacted several ecosystems and communities. Mineral deposits may have to be extracted from underground sources, or ‘concentrated’ by evaporation.
Such techniques typically deplete, pollute, and otherwise reduce access to fresh water. Local water systems – used by people, animals, including livestock, and plants, including crops – are often seriously endangered as a result.
Extractive mining and related activities have worsened such conditions. But mining companies can often get their way with impunity, often intimidating communities with the help of local politicians, government officials and police.
Such ecological damage has destroyed forest and vegetation cover, caused biodiversity loss and endangered hydrological systems. Extraction activities therefore often involve abuse, with negative consequences for local communities.
The economic gains for local communities are generally modest compared to the negative impacts of mining. The benefits largely accrue to local enablers, while the costs within communities vary depending on circumstances.
The authors also insist that the government own mineral extraction and processing companies. This will reduce foreign dependence and interference, including by major powers such as the United States and China.
Government transparency and accountability, including independent audits, can help ensure fewer adverse impacts and fairer compensation for all involved.
This also prevents the conquest, misuse and deployment of mineral resources by the elite in their own interests. Avoiding such abuse is necessary to ensure that resource revenues actually promote sustainable development, as Bolivia is trying to do.
Sustainability undermined?
New frontiers for mineral extraction are emerging, especially as innovation creates new extraction and processing opportunities. This implies a vicious circle, as global warming becomes both a cause and a consequence of such mineral extraction.
Mining practices threaten ecological fragility and vulnerability. Likewise, exploration and mining in the polar regions and the seabed could have disastrous environmental consequences, including mass extinctions of vulnerable polar and marine life.
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© Inter Press Service (2023) — All rights reservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service