Cordiner said: “The growing list of minerals deemed critical to our economy, national security and net zero transition shows just how urgent it is that the UK finds a way to manage our rising demand for them. Too often the focus is on securing more supply of these minerals, without considering how we can use alternatives, use them more efficiently in the first place, and reuse and recycle them. Given the high environmental and social cost of critical materials, the government must develop a strategy to monitor and reduce our demand for critical minerals, which have wide-ranging applications from batteries to steel alloys. The alternative would simply leave the UK’s Industrial Strategy, its Net Zero Strategy and delivery of future infrastructure more vulnerable to chance and unnecessary risk.”
The new Criticality Assessment also follows the National Engineering Policy Centre's recent report on Critical Materials, which includes further recommendations for how to cut the UK's critical material footprint.
