Andover mine in Western Australia. Stock picture. Photo: Paul-Alain Hunt © 2022 Unsplash

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The transition to a low-carbon economy and the expansion of key technologies enabling it – electric vehicles, wind power and solar panels – has created a race for critical raw materials among industrialized countries. Intensified extraction in both higher and lower income countries carries significant implications for environmental and human rights protection. Finding the right governance tools to balance competing goals and demands is key to ensure sustainability. 

Critical raw materials are used in advanced manufacturing, digital technologies, military, defense systems, and most importantly, clean energy technologies. As global demand for critical raw materials rises, increased extraction is leading to conflicting goals across different areas of policy and levels of government and often contributes to exacerbated environmental injustices and climate vulnerability in sites of extraction.

Countries govern natural resources based on their industrial structures, economic needs, and national security priorities. From the European Union’s point of view, increased global demands for critical raw minerals need to be mitigated to ensure their sustainable extraction.
 

What to expect

Leading critical raw materials governance researchers with expertise on Asia, Europe and Latin America will present their latest research focusing on:

• The current state of governance for critical raw materials
• To what extent and in what ways human rights and environmental standards are being integrated into the governance of critical raw materials
• Bottom-up and alternative governance solutions for handling trade-offs between extraction and sustainability
• Challenges and opportunities in political and institutional conditions to enhance sustainable governance of critical raw materials

Speakers

Susan Park
Professor of Global Governance, University of Sydney, Australia

Erika Weinthal
Professor in Environmental Governance, Duke University, US

Hyeyoon Park
Lecturer in International Politics, University of Stirling, Scotland

Scott Odell
Program Scientist MIT Environmental Solutions Initiative, US

Rasmus Kløcker Larsen 
Senior Research Fellow, Stockholm Environment Institute

GRIP-ARM Project

Nordic Institute of Latin American Studies

SEI: Governing critical raw materials and the energy transition

Mistra Mineral Governance: Governing Critical Raw Materials and the Energy Transition

For further queries please contact: 

aysem.mert@statsvet.su.se and maria-therese.gustafsson@statsvet.su.se