Canada announces first investments under G7 pact, aims to stockpile critical minerals

Canada announced on Friday the first round of projects under a G7 critical minerals production alliance envisioned as a counterweight to China’s dominance in the sector. The 25 initiatives include purchase agreements for a Quebec graphite mine and investments to scale up a rare earth elements refinery in Ontario. Canada’s energy and natural resources minister said the alliance’s first initiatives should be seen as a clear signal the group is serious about reducing market concentrations, safeguarding national security and driving investment. “As we move swiftly to reduce dependence on concentrated supply chains, our collective commitment is clear. Every delay is a concession of economic and national security interests. We will no longer accept that,” said Minister Tim Hodgson. China is a major critical mineral miner and even bigger refiner, with an average market share of 70 per cent for 19 out 20 key minerals, according to the International Energy Agency. For rare earth elements — which are hard to extract and used to make powerful magnets found in everything from electric vehicles to advanced radar systems — its position is even more dominant, accounting for 91 per cent of global refining production. The country has in recent months leveraged that position to tighten export limits on such minerals, ramping up pressure on G7 ministers to advance talks on how to diversify their supply chains during their two days of meetings in Toronto this week. Some temporary relief arrived just before those talks began on Thursday when China agreed as part of a deal with the United States to pause export controls for one year on some rare earth minerals. Yet the U.S. energy secretary suggested in Toronto that this still underlined the need for the G7 to establish its own ability to mine and process its own minerals. “China, frankly, just used non-market practices to squish the rest of the industry, the rest of the world out of manufacturing those products with strategic leverage. Everybody sees that now,” Secretary Chris Wright said at a Friday news conference. The slew of investments announced out of the G7 meetings included offtake agreements for Nouveau Monde Graphite’s Matawinie mine near Montreal. The mine’s offtake deals, an agreement to buy part of the mine’s future production, came from the federal government, Panasonic and Traxys, a Luxembourg mineral company. Hodgson also announced Canada is backing a Norwegian company’s plan to build a synthetic graphite plant in St. Thomas, Ont., with up to $500 million in potential financing from Export Development Canada. The company, Vianode, announced in January it had signed a multibillion-dollar supply deal with General Motors for its electric vehicles. Graphite is a key component of lithium-ion batteries used for EVs and broader energy storage systems. A Ucore Rare Metals facility in Kingston, Ont., was also conditionally approved for up to $36 million in federal money to help scale up its processing of two rare earth elements — samarium, used to make heat-resistant magnets in nuclear reactors, and gadolinium, a component of nuclear reactors and MRIs. Demand for minerals key to decarbonizing the economy is expected to spike in the coming years. A report by the Canadian Climate Institute earlier this year estimated Canada would need capital investments in the range of $30 billion by 2040 to meet domestic demand alone. Wolfgang Alschner, a University of Ottawa professor, said Canada had appeared to successfully use this week’s G7 talks to put itself at the centre of the minerals discussion. But he also noted the announcements appeared “very much project focused, rather than policy focused.” “Much policy work remains to be done,” particularly on market standards, said Alschner, who studies Canada’s international critical minerals strategy. Story by Jordan Omstead Continue Reading