Critical Minerals for Clean Energy Reference Guide

To address the urgent threat of climate change, it is imperative that governments invest in and deploy clean energy technologies that can help lower greenhouse gas emissions and their associated consequences for public health, fish and wildlife habitat, and infrastructure. However, responsibly procuring the critical minerals and materials needed to create solar panels, wind turbines, electric vehicle (EV) batteries, and other renewable technologies at scale presents its own set of environmental and social challenges.

This reference guide focuses on which critical minerals are needed to deploy renewable energy technologies at scale to meet climate targets. It includes the projected demands of critical minerals, the connection with foreign supply chains, and a look at domestic supplies. We also discuss the environmental and social implications for mining critical minerals both abroad and domestically, examine the supply issues that can emerge from extreme weather disruptions, and provide policy recommendations.