The world, be ambitious but, has never experienced the pressure it is experiencing today throughout history. Economic, political, social and environmental problems are growing day by day and are descending on humanity like a dark cloud. The troublesome part is the interconnected nature of these multi-layered problems. This system will collapse if we do not achieve the necessary transformation for all of them.
The pandemic has destroyed basic daily life practices. Almost the entire world was shut down for a substantial period of time. Afterwards, there were breaks in the economy, supply chains, famous globalization, business life and human expectations and desires. On the other hand, issues such as the future of the planet. The environment and sustainability began to be spoken more loudly. They have come to the fore.
The Russia-Ukraine crisis has put feathers on the troubled world. The pandemic and the problems of globalization were discussed. Additionally, the issue of the ability of countries to be self-sufficient was explored. However, the war in the north revealed how much of a thread the world’s energy and food supply depend on. EU countries gave speeches on carbon, global warming, new energy and production policies. After Russia turned off the natural gas taps, they quietly turned to fossil fuels, their old and ancient friends.
France, Italy, Austria and the Netherlands have announced plans to reactivate their old coal plants. The most ambitious exit was made by the industrial giant Germany. It announced a comprehensive plan. Germany will either restart a full 21 coal plants or delay planned closures for the next two winters. Coal-filled freighters began to take off from Australia and South Africa to Europe.
Meanwhile, despite global commitments to reduce emissions, last year was already a record year for coal. This year, obviously, new records will come!
Humanity needs energy!
Technologies are changing. But the energy need of humanity does not change, on the contrary, it increases exponentially. Energy production based on coal, oil, and gas for the last two hundred years seems to be evolving. It increasingly depends on rare metals with the agenda of ‘green energy’ in the coming period, although not completely today. Just as fossil fuels determined the new world order with the industrial revolution, rare metals will shape this era. Countries possessing these metals will guide its course. This new era is developing with greener and digital technologies. New technologies, renewable energy systems, and electric vehicles are on the rise. This rise will increase the global dependence on rare metals.
Rare metals were stuck in the element table on the school walls. They went unnoticed for years. Now, they are everywhere. Rare metals are now used in hybrid cars, computers, and tablets. They are found in next-generation wind turbines, missile defense systems, and solar panels. They are also used in F-16 aircraft and warships.
Europe must radically increase its use of rare metals to meet its 2050 carbon neutral target. It will need 26 times more than today. Solutions such as solar power, wind power and electric vehicles depend entirely on rare metals. Not only these. Due to digitalization, the demand is increasing significantly.
Rare metals as a political force!
Here, too, there is a serious issue of geopolitics of supply. China is the world’s largest producer of rare metals. Russia is the fourth. Just as in the natural gas supply today, the supply security of these substances poses a very important threat. This threat affects the rest of the world. In this period when the world is slipping, even critical defense systems need rare metals. The primitive war motivation is supported by the latest technology. For example, about four tons of rare metals are used in the construction of a US Virginia-class submarine. At the extreme point of the USA/EU and Russia/China polarization, consider the crises this rare metals issue will cause. China and Russia will completely block their supply!
Another vital issue is the serious damage to the environment in the extraction of rare metals. Rare metal mining produces enormous amounts of toxic and radioactive material. That’s not all. At least 200 cubic meters of acid-saturated water is used to treat one ton of rare metals. This water often ends up in rivers, soil, and groundwater without any treatment.
China is paying a high ecological price as a country whose environmental sensitivity is at the bottom. Today, 10% of the arable land in China is contaminated with heavy metals. 80% of the groundwater is not suitable for consumption. This ecological destruction is, of course, not only China’s problem, but the world’s!
Keep on destroying the planet!
Guillaume Pitron, in his book The Rare Metals War, says that over the next three decades, people will extract more ore. This amount will exceed what has been extracted in the last 70,000 years. This alone is a threat that exacerbate the already morbid condition of the planet today.
Now it is time to manage all these issues sincerely instead of ‘let it go’. But humanity struggles to make predictions for the next 6 months. Taking action is elusive with today’s basic concerns. We are even further from taking a step towards a sustainable future.
Thus, it seems that sustainable healthy future steps have accelerated seriously in the last one or two years. However, they will skid a lot. They will also be interrupted by these developments.