CRMA: why Europe's raw materials revolution needs Smart data

In recent months we have been fortunate enough to participate in a number of global forums including COP28UAE Business & Philanthropy Climate Forum in Dubai in December, Investing in African Mining Indaba in South Africa in February, Prospectors & Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) in Canada in March and last week the EIT RawMaterials Summit in Brussels. Looking ahead to the remainder of 2024, the interest and excitement around our work on mapping the world’s natural capital, including critical raw materials and natural hydrogen, is perhaps the most encouraging sign out of these conferences and conversations.

Our conversations with key decision makers have only reinforced our conviction that the world urgently needs to speed up the deployment of clean energy technology. Only an accelerated and just energy transition will keep us on a sustainable path towards climate-neutrality.

As always, the real tests will have to be passed on the ground, where countless projects across the world have to be designed, financed, and implemented, to reinforce the political ambitions and declarations around the energy transition with real and positive impact.

The European Union has been leading the way with its ambitious 2030 renewable energy targets and by enacting a potentially game-changing EU Critical Raw Materials Act (#CRMA), which enters into force today, 23 May 2024. Europe is to be commended for its foresight, efforts and ambition when it comes to the central role of minerals for the clean energy transition. But as of today, the CRMA is little more than ink on paper. Its benefits are yet to materialise, and they just won’t unless we get the implementation right.

This is one of the reasons we decided to join the EIT RawMaterials consortium last week. We fully agreed with European Commission Executive Vice President Maro? ?ef?ovi? when he stressed at last week’s EIT Raw Material Summit that the value generated by new projects should also stay within partner countries. Similarly, we also entirely support his important observation that the funding question is crucial, and that de-risking investment into new projects is essential. At the same time, we were encouraged to see that countries like France, Germany and Italy are moving ahead with ambitious dedicated new funds focusing on critical raw materials. This was unthinkable just two years ago, yet here we are today

The CRMA sprung from the conviction that the EU needed to diversify its raw materials supply. Domestically, the CRMA has set an ambitious benchmark that the EU should be able to produce 10% of its annual consumption of strategic raw materials on its own. For this to happen, EU Member States need to first understand its own potentials and resources. An ambitious and speedy implementation of the CRMA’s Article 19 on national exploration programmes is key. The external dimension of the CRMA is just as important as the domestic one. DG GROW, DG INTPA and the European External Action Service need to closely align and keep their feet together on the accelerator.

But whether you look for new resources inside the EU or outside of it, you need to understand first where to look. You need the right data that allows you to map the relevant materials. This is, of course, where we come in. Our innovative mapping technology allows us to be at the cutting edge and forefront of the energy transition. Together with our partners across Europe and the world, we can create the data and insights needed to make the CRMA a success story. We are ready to play our part and contribute to this important process.

#criticalrawmaterials #naturalhydrogen #energytransition

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