A UE quer reduzir a dependência de potências como a China no fornecimento de minerais até ao final da década. Com as tensões geopolíticas a aumentar, EU DECODED levanta a questão de se a UE conseguirá acompanhar os concorrentes.
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00:00Some are calling them the new oil of the world economy.
00:18These minerals and metals are essential for producing new technologies like microchips, electric cars and solar panels.
00:27And governments are scrambling to secure them.
00:31China is using its market dominance to weaken its rivals.
00:36US President Donald Trump has invoked wartime powers to boost production and has even threatened
00:43to seize mineral-rich Canada and Greenland.
00:47But where is the European Union in the global race for raw materials?
00:52We break it down in EU Decoded.
00:55The EU has listed 34 critical raw materials it considers essential.
00:5917 are prioritized as strategic.
01:02They include cobalt, lithium, manganese and nickel used in electric vehicles and gallium, copper
01:09and silicon metal used in solar panels.
01:13The Critical Raw Materials Act sets targets for the EU to extract 10%, process 40% and recycle
01:2025% of the strategic materials it consumes by the end of this decade.
01:25Part of the EU strategy means mining but also refining and recycling more raw materials at
01:32home in Europe.
01:34The European Commission recently selected 47 new strategic projects in 13 EU countries.
01:41But how do Europeans feel about the prospect of mining returning to their backyards?
01:47Unabhängigkeit finde ich nicht verkehrt, wenn man anbetracht halt der Abhängigkeit jetzt
01:51so glaube ich auch gerade das Thema mit den Abhängigkeiten von chinesischen Erden und so.
01:54Ja, ich befürchte, dass das Bergrecht so gestaltet wird, dass die Gemeinden wenigstenspruchsrecht
02:01haben bzw. Mitspracherecht und ich meine Brüssel ist weit weg von irgendeiner kleinen Posemuckel-Gemeinde.
02:06Oh, also ich meine, es hört sich danach an, dass vielleicht Arbeitsplätze geschaffen werden können, was gut ist?
02:12C'è il fatto che ci sono i cinesi che fanno come gli pare, per cui, ma anche gli stessi americani,
02:18poi non parliamo dell'Africa, dei cinesi in Africa, per cui, io dico che secondo me smettiamo
02:25di farlo, perché c'è qualcuno che si sporca le mani al notte del nostro conto.
02:30Robert Hodgson is our senior energy and environment reporter and he's been following the Critical
02:43Raw Materials Act for Euronews. Robert, thank you for joining us. First, can you tell us why
02:49there's such a rush here in Brussels to both mine more at home, but also to diversify Europe's mineral suppliers?
02:56Two reasons. First of all, demand for these minerals is rising because they're needed
03:02for the energy transition. Modern technology and now weapons is becoming a more significant
03:07factor. The other problem that Europe has is that over years they've developed dependencies
03:12on other countries for the supply of these things that not much is produced in Europe.
03:16Brussels also is looking further afield. It's been running this diplomatic campaign to strike
03:22agreements with various third countries. They say these are like-minded third countries.
03:27Is this campaign to strike these deals working? Well, the diplomatic offensive began in 2021 with the
03:34signing of a memorandum of understanding with Canada, which I suppose you can quite happily call
03:38like-minded. And it's also a powerhouse of minerals production. They followed with several others.
03:45The next one was Ukraine, and that was signed just six months before the Russian invasion.
03:51Since then, they've built up the number of these MOUs to 14, and they have other countries,
03:56including Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of Congo. And it's becoming more evident that there's a
04:02problem around the sort of moral questions around whether we should be doing business with a certain
04:07country. Rwanda has come into focus recently because the Rwandan military has been supporting
04:13rebel groups in the Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. And there's been credible reports from
04:17the UN and NGOs that minerals are being smuggled across the border into Rwanda and then exported to
04:23Europe. And these are sort of known as conflict minerals. You can see the same moral questions
04:29arising in Ukraine because the EU has its memorandum signed with Ukraine. But at the same time,
04:34the Trump administration has been pushing Ukraine to sign a deal with the US in exchange for continued
04:41military support. Well, they want access, essentially open access to all of the Ukraine's mineral wealth.
04:46Thirteen EU countries have been selected for new raw materials projects. But domestic measures aren't
04:52enough. The EU has also struck partnerships on minerals with 14 world countries, including Australia,
04:59Chile and the DRC. This is to reduce dependencies. For example, the EU relies on China for 100% of its rare earths,
05:09Turkey for 98% of boron and South Africa for 71% of platinum.
05:16Joining me now to delve a little bit deeper into the Critical Raw Materials Act is Eduardo Rigetti,
05:21who is a researcher in energy resources and climate change at the CEPs think tank here in Brussels.
05:28The Critical Raw Materials Act was conceived to kind of support and underpin the European Green Deal, but now we're seeing a push to rearm Europe.
05:36Does this mean also that the act is becoming even more critical and strategic for the EU?
05:42Yeah, it is true that the aerospace and defence sectors also heavily depend on critical raw materials.
05:48Applications such as aircrafts or vessels and ammunition as well as satellites and other space applications
05:55all require materials like rare earths, graphite, cobalt and others.
06:00One of the goals of the act is to actually increase the amount of critical raw materials that the EU recycles by the end of this decade.
06:09If this is a possibility and an attractive route for the EU, why are we not doing more of this, the recycling already?
06:17For most of these materials, recycling rates are still relatively low and this is because from one side we do not have enough technologies that have reached the hand of life yet,
06:27but at the same time it is due to other more structural issues related to, for instance, technical issues with recycling as well as the cost of recycling.
06:34Given that there is a potential trade war heating up between the two biggest world economies right now, do you think the EU needs to consider other policy options to address its vulnerability when it comes to sourcing raw materials?
06:50Now, there are several elements within the act that go in that direction from the improvement of risk monitoring efforts, including through stress testing, but also the requirements for large companies using these materials.
07:03Now, all these elements together with other medium to long term strategies such as setting up partnerships with resource rich countries can help mitigate supply risks.
07:13But at the same time, of course, we know there's no one single silver bullet and even setting up these systems will take time, especially in the EU.
07:23In an energy transition and a global arms race, the demand for minerals will only increase.
07:29But competition is aggressive and could revive historic inequalities.
07:34Trump is demanding access to Greenland, Canada and Ukraine's mineral wealth.
07:39In places like Myanmar and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the mineral rush continues to drive conflict.
07:47The European Union still says it's counting on a secure and sustainable supply.