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Snapshot of 2024: Transition Minerals Key Publications

31 déc. 2024

 

In 2024, unmistakable progress was made in placing transition minerals at the forefront of international discussions. Key milestones included the release of the UN Secretary-General’s Panel report, the Global Council for Responsible Transition Minerals unveiling seven pivotal recommendations for better global governance, and a range of initiatives which raised awareness of the challenges tied to transition minerals.


The Paris Peace Forum’s Global Council for Responsible Transition Minerals is committed to addressing the fragmented efforts surrounding transition minerals. To this end, this article provides a short list of key resources published in 2024, to help navigate the complexities of the evolving landscape and capture critical evolutions. These reports offer insights into key challenges, opportunities, best practices, and policy recommendations.


  • Global Critical Minerals Outlook 2024, International Energy Agency (IEA) (May 2024). This report provides an outlook for demand and supply for key energy transition minerals including copper, lithium, nickel, cobalt, graphite and rare earth elements. The report also assesses key risks to the reliability, sustainability and diversity of critical mineral supply chains and analyses the consequences for policy and industry stakeholders. It is accompanied by an updated version of the Critical Minerals Data Explorer, an interactive online tool that allows users to explore the latest IEA projections.

  • Transition Minerals Tracker: 2024 Analysis, Business & Human Rights Resource Center (May 2024). The report spotlights the human rights challenges and harm of irresponsible transition mineral mining – and the associated risk of derailing the pace of the transition. The tracker includes 630 allegations of abuse from 2010-2023 associated with the mining of seven key minerals for the energy transition: bauxite, cobalt, copper, lithium, manganese, nickel and zinc.

  • Resourcing the Energy Transition, Principles to Guide Critical Energy Transition Minerals Towards Equity and Justice, UN Secretary-General’s Panel on Critical Energy Transition Minerals (September 2024). The report, building on existing standards and initiatives, develops a set of common and voluntary principles to guide the transition. It provides seven principles, including protecting human rights, safeguarding the planet, its environment and biodiversity, promoting justice and equity, benefit-sharing, responsible investment, finance and trade, transparency and accountability, and international cooperation. To embed and maintain these Guiding Principles across critical energy transition mineral value chains, the Panel also recommends five actionable recommendations.

  • Securing Minerals for the Energy Transition: Unlocking the Value Chain through Policy, Investment and Innovation, World Economic Forum (September 2024). This paper explores various approaches for unlocking critical minerals supply. It identifies barriers to investment and innovation in critical minerals and associated solutions for addressing them. It also highlights the need for global multistakeholder collaboration across the value chain and wider ecosystem to lower barriers and enable solutions.

  • The future of European competitiveness, Mario Draghi (September 2024). The report looks at the challenges faced by the industry and companies in the Single Market. The findings of the report will contribute to the Commission’s work on a new plan for Europe’s sustainable prosperity and competitiveness. A significant portion of the report is dedicated to addressing critical raw materials. The report underscores the increasing demand for these minerals in the EU driven by the green and digital transitions, with demand expected to rise to 300% by 2030. The report calls for substantial investments to secure the supply of minerals in Europe, both “at home and in resource-rich countries” to ensure EU’s independence.

  • Landscape Report:  The Role of Investors in Realising an Environmentally and Socially Responsible Mining Industry, Mining 2030 (October 2024). This report maps the current and projected future of the mining landscape, including the challenges, opportunities, and impacts of mining activities. The aim is to inform the development of the Commission’s strategic objectives and priority actions. It looks at why, and how, mining is changing in response to market demand and stakeholder influences. It analyses the impacts of those changes, and pinpoints six strategic objectives to steer institutional investors towards the Commission’s vision for a more socially and environmentally responsible mining sector by 2030.

  • Critical transitions. Working Paper October 2024 Circularity, equity, and responsibility in the quest for energy transition minerals, United Nations Environment Programme (October 2024). This paper outlines a vision for a future where more efficient, circular and responsible use of energy transition minerals equips the green transition, while concurrently meeting climate, biodiversity and pollution goals.

  • Global Council for Responsible Transition Minerals interim report, Paris Peace Forum (November 2024). This report aims to move beyond fragmented approaches and foster a more integrated, collaborative dialogue, encouraging a shift from isolated perspectives to a cohesive global narrative. To advance this vision, the Global Council advocates for strengthened global governance tools, including an international agreement on resource management, a central data repository, and a public-private financing mechanism. To ground political discussions in well-substantiated, factual insights, the Council also calls for expanded research into value creation within mineral-producing nations and an in-depth analysis of narratives that conflate oil and mineral dependencies. Finally, to equip stakeholders for a range of future scenarios, the Council proposes a study to explore strategic pathways under diverse global conditions.

  • Recycling of Critical Minerals, IEA (November 2024). This report aims to evaluate the current status of recycling of minerals critical to the energy transition, analyses the prospects for secondary supply under different scenarios, and outlines targeted policy recommendations to accelerate the uptake of recycling that can pave the way for more sustainable and secure future mineral supply chains. The report shows that while recycling does not eliminate the need for mining investment, it creates a valuable secondary supply source that reduces reliance on new mines and enhances supply security for countries importing minerals. Moreover, it mitigates the environmental and social impacts related to mining and refining while preventing waste from end-use technologies ending up in landfills.


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Should you wish your report to be included in our snapshot of 2024 publications, feel free to contact us via LinkedIn.


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