Moving towards a less mining-intensive energy system

As the energy sector embarks on a global transition towards a sustainable energy system, there is increasing discourse around the future requirements for minerals. The expected significant increase in energy transition-related mineral demand between 2020 and 2040 is prompting questions about the resulting mining requirement and related environmental impacts.¹ Widespread concerns about the minerals required for renewable-energy technologies and predictions of increased mining for these minerals have received strong media and policy attention.

While environmental and societal effects of mining are undoubtedly reason for caution,^2,3 what’s needed to settle this dispute, is to place energy transition related mineral demand into the context of how this will compare to current mining activities for our fossil-fuel–dominated energy system. For the first time, strategists from Deloitte Consulting and researchers from Leiden University and Delft University of Technology joined forces to right-size these changes. Together they published their findings in a recent article in scientific journal Joule⁴, filling that gap in knowledge.

Contrary to public and policy concerns, they found a decrease in overall global mining activities, even while they assume an incredibly rapid expansion of clean energy technologies such as in the International Energy Agency (IEA) pathway to net-zero emissions (NZE).¹⁰

“The IEA scenario we looked at assumes that the demand for energy-transition-related minerals increases more than 6 times by 2040, yet mining activity would still be substantially lower than today”

- Joey Nijnens, Lead author

Minerals and mining activity for an NZE Future

Despite the decreasing scale of overall mining activities, substantial energy-transition-related mining activities remain necessary to feed the energy transition – Energy transition mining activities in the IEA NZE scenario will likely surpass the declining mining scale for fossil energy towards 2035, which would presumably only rise without an NZE transition.

"Even when we exclude oil and gas and assume this rapid clean energy expansion, mining activity for the energy system drops by almost half globally compared to 2021 coal extraction." 

– René Kleijn, Prof. Resilient Resource Supply, Leiden University

The energy transition related mining activities are mainly driven by the need for copper and nickel for (EV) batteries, the article’s authors concluded. In the NZE scenario, the extraction of minerals for energy transition technologies is projected to begin to fall around 2045 before ever reaching the current level of mining activities for coal consumption. The reason for this decline is the significant difference in their way of consumption.

"For energy transition technologies and infrastructure, the spike in demand will last only as long as it takes to build the net-zero infrastructure, after which mineral demand will only come from replacing decommissioned capacity or capacity expansions. Fossil-related extraction on the other hand, if allowed to continue unabated, will dissipate resources indefinitely."

– Oscar Kraan, PhD.

Recycling and reuse for a circular system

To further reduce our dependence on mining for our future energy system, it will be critical to recycle and reuse the materials found in end-of-life technologies.⁵ The article’s authors conclude that recycling decommissioned technologies enables the leveraging of mineral stocks in society. The expected high mining activity for copper and nickel can be reduced via recycling of the first wave of decommissioned energy technologies. To truly optimize the supply of secondary minerals, recycling efficiency should be improved through technology-specific methods enabling efficient mineral extraction of the relatively uniform waste streams such as EV batteries, solar panels and wind turbine components that will gradually grow in the coming decades.⁶

Mining activities could even be reduced to a greater extent by integrating circular strategies from the outset. Examples of such strategies would be to reuse or repower end-of-life EV batteries for grid-level storage, expanding the technology’s useful lifetime. A drastic reduction in the amount of nickel, copper and other minerals needed to make batteries could also be enabled by the maturing of novel technologies.¹ However, currently it’s difficult to foresee what the next generation of batteries will require. We also must consider that next-generation technologies, like solid-state batteries, could increase mineral requirements, potentially boosting lithium demand by up to 28%.⁴ But in general, Innovations should help us reach reduced-material goals, as energy densities are found to continually improve over time.⁷

Societal change to help the cause

Changing our mining requirements will necessitate forward-thinking behaviour not just from energy-sector stakeholders, but also from the general public. Recycling initiatives could be paired with strategies such as encouraging electric vehicle owners to participate in the electric-grid storage market (reducing the demand for stationary electricity storage), or promoting shifts towards using electric bicycles and public transportation, reducing overall demand for EVs.⁸ Fewer materials would be needed for all EV components and the infrastructure that will power the expanding EV fleet on our roads. Efforts should also extend off the roads, for example to our buildings where retrofits can reduce materials needed to produce energy.

Great concern, great potential

One key insight is that materials such as copper are extracted from different locations than coal. Therefore, while globally we might experience a decrease in mining activity during the clean energy transition, it is crucial for governments and companies to ensure that local societal and environmental impacts are not neglected.

While industry players and policymakers must be careful in charting a just clean energy transition that limits mineral extraction as much as possible, the authors’ research has shown that global mining activity will not greatly expand with our transition to an NZE scenario – not as we ramp up transition efforts, nor in the long-term future. When moving full speed ahead on the energy transition, policy makers and businesses can now focus on the facts and prioritise the instrumental circular strategies in further mitigating the mining footprint of the energy transition.

_{1  IEA, The Role of Critical Minerals in Clean Energy Transitions, 2021.
2  Lèbre, E´ ., et al. (2020). The social and environmental complexities of extracting energy transition metals. Nat. Commun. 11, 4823.
3  Priester, M., et al. (2019). Mineral grades: an important indicator for environmental impact of mineral exploitation. Miner. Econ.32, 49–73.
4  Joey Nijnens, et al., “Energy transition will require substantially less mining than the current fossil system,” Joule 7, no. 11 (2023), pp 2408–13.
5  Ibid; Saleem H. Ali, et al., “Mineral supply for sustainable development requires resource governance,” Nature 543 (2017), pp. 367–72.
6  Chengjian Xu, et al., “Future material demand for automotive lithium-based batteries,” Commun. Mater. 1, no. 99 (2020).
7  IEA, The Role of Critical Minerals in Clean Energy Transitions, 2021.
8  IEA, Net Zero by 2050 - A Roadmap for the Global Energy Sector, 2021.}