Minerva Research Initiative DECUR Partnership - Critical Minerals, Battery Technology, & Reducing Dependence on Hostile Suppliers in the Clean Energy Supply Chain
Abstract
Field 7 - Critical Minerals, Battery Technology, and Reducing Dependence on Hostile Suppliers in-the Clean Energy Supply Chain (1 page limit)-NFO Number: HQ003422NFOEASD04-Topic 1: Social Implications of Environmental Change-Topic 2: Resource Competition, Social Cohesion, and Strategic Climate Resilience-Dr. Joshua Busby (PI), University of Texas at Austin, LBJ School of Public Affairs-Other Investigators and Institutions: PME Co-PI, Dr. Emily Holland, US Naval War College-Dr. Morgan Bazilian, Colorado School of Mines-Dr. Mark Deinert, Colorado School of Mines-The clean energy transition will be minerals and metals intensive. Currently, supply chains are-overwhelmingly reliant on imports from China. Given rising geo-strategic tensions between the United-States and China, that dependence has potentially troubling implications for U.S. national security. In order to understand whether and how such dependence might create national security risks requires an exploration into the nature and extent of likely future demand for and supplies of raw materials and intermediate inputs as the scope and scale of demand for batteries and other inputs increase. Further, although metals and minerals have different properties from liquid fuels, they potentially can be employed as coercive foreign policy tools. The control of energy supplies was the basis for the 1973 oil crisis and is causing significant global shifts as a result of Russia#s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Such an effort with minerals and metals, if it were to be employed by the PRC, could potentially cause significant disruption to Western economies and national security.-The project, what we term #Minerals, Batteries, and Clean Energy# (MB-CE), aims to interrogate more-fully foundational social science questions, particularly important since the U.S. has costly plans to-diversify its supply chains for these materials. These diversification plans could raise the costs associated with the clean energy transition and will require significant transformations in trade and alliance patterns. The MB-CE project will use two expert roundtable convenings to collect state-of-the-art social science informed approaches to modeling and understanding these questions. We will invite experts from academia, security, and policy to two workshops where they will present short memos for comment and discussion. After each workshop, we will write a synthesis report that summarizes collective findings and identifies potential research gaps and promising approaches. The third component will be a table-top exercise (TTX) where participants will role play a major supply disruption to the battery and metals supply chain. The TTX will produce a summary report and brief for a wider policy audience. PME students will be involved in writing the report and brief and administering and participating in the TTX.-The core contribution of MB-CE to social science will be surfacing best practices in understanding and-modeling this dynamic decision space, identifying critical gaps and potential paths forward for overcoming them at the intersection of technology, society, and security. The implications for national security are a more robust analytical basis for decision-making. Given the stakes, including revived geo-strategic competition with China as well as a re-orientation of the U.S. national economy to revive manufacturing, an examination of the foundations for the emergent turn to diversification of supply chains and on-shoring and ally-shoring of supply is important and necessary.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- Aug 11, 2023
- Source ID
- N000142312722
Entities
People
- Joshua Busby
Organizations
- Office of Naval Research
- United States Navy
- University of Texas at Austin