Canada announces the first critical minerals projects under the G7 partnership – nationally
Canada announced on Friday the first round of projects under the G7 Clive Minerals Amplified Allisonce bound as a counterweight to China’s dominance in the sector.
25 plans include purchase agreements for the Quebec Graphite mine and investments to scale a rare earth refinery in Ontario.
Canada’s Minister of Environment and the Minister of the Environment said that the first platforms of the Alliance should be seen as a clear sign that the group is serious about reducing market concentration, protecting national security and investing explosively.
“As we move quickly to reduce our reliance on centralized supply chains, our collective commitment is clear. Any delay is in the economic and national interest. We can no longer tolerate that,” said Minister Tim Hodgson.
China is a major mineral mine and a major consumer, with an average market share of 70 percent of 19 foreign minerals, according to the International Energy Agency. Among the rare earth materials – which are difficult to extract and are used to make powerful magnets available in everything from electric cars to advanced radar systems – its position is very large, accounting for 91 percent of global production.
The country has in recent months been given that position to strengthen the export limit of those minerals, to set pressure on the G7 Ministers to change their speeches for two days of meetings in Toronto this week.
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A brief reprieve came just before those talks were to begin on Thursday when China agreed as part of a deal with the United States to temporarily suspend traditional global controls.
However, the US Secretary of Energy suggested in Toronto that this emphasized the need for the G7 to establish its own energy and process its minerals.
“China, frankly, has just used non-market means to isolate the entire industry, the entire world without making those products that are strategically lonely. Everyone can see that now,” Secretary Chris Wright said at a Friday news conference.
The execution of funds announced at the G7 meetings included agreements to withdraw from the Matawniinie Mine of Nouveau Monde Graphinie near Montreal. The mine exit offers, an agreement to buy part of the future production, came to the Federal Government, Panasonic and Traxys, a Luxembourg Mineral company.
Hodgson also announced that Canada has backed a Norwegian company’s plan to build a synthetic graphite plant in St. Thomas, Ontario.
The company, Vianode, announced in January that it had signed a multibillion dollar deal with General Motors for its electric vehicles.
Graphite is a key component of lithium-ion batteries used in EVS and wider energy storage systems.
Ucore Rare Metals Center in Kingston, Ont.
The need for Consorals key to Decarbonisizing the economy is expected to be discussed in the coming years. A report by the Canadian Climate Institute earlier this year estimated that it would require capital investment in the range of $30 billion by 2040 to meet domestic demand alone.
Wolfgang Alschner, University of Ottawa professor, said that Canada was already successfully using the G7’s G7 talks to isolate itself from the center of the mineral discussion. But he also noted the announcements appeared to be “a very large project focused, rather than a focused policy.”
“A lot of policy work still needs to be done,” especially at the market level, said Alychner, who studies Canada’s critical Minerals Strategy.
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