18 · MT 2/2023 Hot Spots scheme also includes recycling of electronic waste (‘e-waste’) which is in progress. Since about 2008, the EU recognizes recycling as a source for many critical elements. In addition to this, processing of ore concentrates from both domestic and foreign sources (e.g., aluminum-bearing ores like bauxite) plays an important role for extracting by-products like hafnium and indium (France) and gallium and selenium (Germany). For these strategic commodities, both these countries are important producers in the EU. However, the European Commission feels that the EU has not developed any new resources during the last decade, especially REEs. Particularly the Scandinavian countries have since undertaken exploration programmes during which new resources have been identified. There are promising results from recent exploratory campaigns that could result in reduced dependency on foreign supplies. Sweden could turn the tables on China by developing the EU’s premier REE mining operation. Stateowned mining company LKAB, which already exploits the EU’s largest iron ore deposit near Kiruna, reported that it found a “large concentration” of REEs in close vicinity to the Kiruna mine. The new find includes REEs contained in magnetite-(heamatite)-apatite ores of the Kiruna type. It was said that the REE content in the mineral fluorapatite exceeds weight-percent levels. By-product production could be initiated in ten to 15 years, so Swedish authorities expect that Sweden could be the EU’s major producer of REEs in the 2030. “Ni-Co Laterite Deposits of the World – Database and Grade and Tonnage Models,” such residual materials contain about 70 % of world’s nickel resources, have been mined for more than 100 years, and account for about 55 % of world’s nickel production in 2018. Owing to the potential for comparatively low capital costs and lower economic cut-off ore grades, heap leaching methodologies have been proposed as an alternative processing route for the processing of nickel laterites by a number of recent projects. Among them is European Nickel’s Çaldag project in Turkey. Novelties in the Criticality Matrix Securing access to stable supply chains have become a major challenge for national and regional economies with limited indigenous natural resources, such as most of the EU’s member states. Access to domestic resources will be of critical importance in the 2020s to improve resilience towards supply shortages in strategic and critical raw materials. The European Commission warns of a “quite difficult” access to domestic reserves and resources, however, which is caused by a lack of exploration and mining activities. Mining will be critical to Europe’s economy and national defence in the 2020s. The need for primary materials from own sources, such as ores and concentrates, and also for processed and refined materials is crucial for the European defence industrial sector. This ˘
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