Two Threatening Predicaments, Environmental & Geopolitical
The U.S. faces two serious predicaments of our own making that obstructionists are preventing us from addressing.
Our first predicament is that we are releasing and burning fossil fuels, carbon-dioxide, methane, and other greenhouse gases resulting in global warming and abnormal weather-related events – extreme temperatures, wildfires, smoke and smog, drought, dried up rivers, melting glaciers, rising oceans, severe storms, tidal surge, flooding, collapsing coastlines, property destruction, higher insurance premiums, health problems, and life tragedies. Thousands of scientists around world have researched this problem and acknowledge that we all contribute to it.
We must reduce our use of fossil fuels and, to do so, we need to substitute them with critical metals. (Recycling will not suffice; we simply do not have enough material ‘in the system’ to meet our growing needs.) Herein lies our second predicament, that over the last generation or two, the United States has ceded our abilities to mine ores and/or process metals to other nations many of whom are bad actors, some outright adversarial. Three cases in point:
Our dominant rare earth mine, Mountain Pass, transshipped its ore to China who processed it before turning around and selling those metals to the U.S. and our allies. Today, China controls the supply of rare earth metals essential to advanced technologies including those needed for clean energy solutions.
Over several decades, the United States shuttered most of our uranium mines in favor of buying stock from other countries, including those in Russia’s orbit. Uranium is a “dense” – read: powerful – carbon-free fuel now very much needed as we transition to less dense renewable energies such as solar and wind.
The U.S. mines less than 1% of the world’s nickel needed in electric vehicles / lithium-ion batteries and other environmentally beneficial technologies. Our primary nickel mine in Michigan is nearing end-of-life and we have been increasingly reliant for our supplies on the dirty operators in Russia and now Indonesian mines under China’s control.
These dependencies have put our environmental plans in jeopardy, but it’s worse than that. They have also exposed the United States to major national security risks because these metals are central to the defense of the United States. Rare earths find no end of uses in advance electronics, our need for uranium is obvious, and nickel is used for such things as high-temperature aerospace and military alloys. Make no mistake about it, Russia and China want to control these supply-chains.
To address these two predicaments, the federal government is now stimulating private sector investment in the mining and processing / enrichment of critical metals. However, the parties are meeting strong resistance from “not-in-my-backyard”, so called NIMBY, activists. Case in point – local opponents of non-ferrous mining in Minnesota have succeeded in derailing two nickel projects, Twin Metals near the Boundary Waters Canoe Area and PolyMet/NorthMet farther south but also in the Superior National Forest. One promising project remains in Aitken County, Talon Metals’ Tamarack mine, but here too, parochial obstructionists have lined up against it.
Their arguments are incomplete and fallacious. Here a just a few examples surrounding their push to keep nickel mining out of Minnesota:
Incremental demand for nickel simply doesn’t exist … never mind the projections of the International Energy Agency.
We don’t need nickel because LFP (lithium ferro phosphate) and other batteries will come to dominate; one technology will suit all … never mind that different consumers demand different technologies with different performance characteristics including those of lithium-ion / nickel.
Sulfide mining of nickel ore is instantly, significantly, and/or uncontrollably polluting … never mind that ‘contained’ ore – i.e., not exposed to air or water for prolonged periods of time – need not be beyond de minimis levels.
The amount of nickel involved here is immaterial relative to our needs … never mind that the U.S. Geological Survey believes that Minnesota and Michigan may contain deposits of nickel that rival those of Russia or elsewhere in the world.
We must protect wild rice shallows … never mind that much of wild rice acreage in Minnesota is found at higher elevations from the mining site in question or that global warming is potentially more threatening to that native crop.
We must protect the “rare freshwater jellyfish”, Craspedacusta sowerbii … never mind that it is considered an invasive species.
Recognizing that mining and refining involves risks, just as any venture does, we must now clear the room of the idealogues, streamline our regulatory approval processes, and mobilize our most experienced and level-headed people to develop safe and efficient critical ore and metal operations. To do otherwise is to deny our threatening environmental and geopolitical predicaments.