EU: the Critical Raw Materials Act enters into force

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The European Union’s Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA), issued as Regulation (EU) 2024/1252, took effect on May 23, 2024.

The primary goal of the CRMA is to maintain and provide a secure and sustainable supply of Critical Raw Materials to the European Union. Annexes 1 and 2 to the Regulation list 34 critical materials, 17 of which are considered strategical because their demand is set to increase exponentially, as they are crucial for both the green and the digital transitions as well as for industrial value chains in general, and for strategic technologies in areas such as space and defense in particular: aluminium/bauxite/alumina*, coking coal, lithium*, phosphorus, antimony, feldspar, light rare earth elements*, scandium, arsenic, fluorspar, magnesium, silicon metal*, baryte, gallium*, manganese*, strontium, beryllium, germanium*, natural graphite*, tantalum, bismuth*, hafnium, niobium, titanium metal*, boron*, helium, platinum group metals*, tungsten*, cobalt*, heavy rare earth elements*, phosphate rock, vanadium, copper*, nickel*
(*strategic raw materials).

These materials are found in a variety of common appliances and in products essential to the EU’s economy, including smartphones, electric vehicles, wind turbines, semiconductors, and planes. For certain critical raw materials, the EU relies completely on one country, such as: heavy rare earth elements (100% from China), boron (98% from Turkey), or platinum (71% from South Africa).

The CRMA recognizes the dependence on Critical Raw Materials for the European internal market and economies, considers the high concentration of such raw materials within few third countries as a potential risk to their supply, and sets a multifaceted approach to both strengthen the value chain of these raw materials and cover their annual consumption by 2030:

• >10% domestic extraction
• >40% domestic processing
• >25% recycling
• <65% single-source (in this regard, the EU is already forming strategic alliances and encouraging raw mineral partnerships).