All eyes are on COP27 and financing the clean energy transition in emerging economies is high on the agenda.

To build the renewable energy infrastructure the world needs at speed and scale, circular economy will play a vital role like factoring circularity into the design stage. In the transition to clean energy, critical minerals bring new challenges to energy security. According to the IEA, getting to net zero by 2040 will require a six-fold increase in mineral input by 2040, some key metals, such a lithium, could see growth rates of over 40 times, with nickel and cobalt demand growing more than 20 fold.

See the attached image: IEA, Minerals used in clean energy technologies compared to other power generation sources, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/minerals-used-in-clean-e…, IEA. License: CC BY 4.0

How can we reshape the renewable energy industry, including EVs and batteries, to reduce the dependence on virgin critical materials in order to stem biodiversity loss and ecological degradation from unsustainable mining?