Material Criticality: An Overview for Decision-Makers

Schrijvers, Dieuwertje et al. 2020. Material Criticality: An Overview for Decision-Makers. IRTC Business. Brochure. 

Looking back at technological developments throughout the past centuries, we are living in an exciting era of technological innovation. Technological complexity has been increasing exponentially since the industrial evolution and is accelerating ever since. This has provided us great wealth, but at the same time has led to several societal challenges. High levels of pollution, losses of biodiversity, and, of course, climate change are consequences of continued economic growth worldwide. The first challenge we face now lies in the prevention of further environmental detriment, while maintaining stable economies and increased welfare globally. A key strategy to achieve this is to increase energy efficiency and decrease dependency on fossil fuels. This brings us to the second challenge of this era. Technologies, including technologies that contribute to sustainable development, such as renewable energy and low-carbon mobility, rely increasingly on raw materials. Materials are not only used in increasing quantities, also a wider range of materials is used, which are often combined, resulting in increasingly complex products . Whereas some of these materials can be considered scarce, more pressing concerns about the use of raw materials is the uneven distribution of reserves in the world, making many countries highly dependent on only a few exporting countries. Furthermore, mining can be energy-intensive and can be associated with environmental and social problems, such as deforestation and child labor. Recycling of materials – which could contribute to a stable supply and less environmental and social burden – is often not taking place, due to the complex raw materials mixes within the products, making them difficult to separate, and lacking economic incentives. Finally, certain technologies, such as electric vehicles, wind turbines, and solar panels, have high expected growth rates. It is not guaranteed that this increasing demand for raw materials can be met by an increased supply, considering that the development of new mines is a slow process and many minority metals do not provide sufficient revenue to drive mining operations. Raw materials that play an important role in economic or technological development, while at the same time have precarious supply chains, are often called “critical”. The identification of these critical raw materials (CRMs) and the mitigation of their criticality has become an important task of researchers, companies, and policymakers in their pursuit of sustainable economic well-being.