🌱 What is the Critical Minerals Security Act?
The act aims to aid the U.S. in securing access to critical minerals and reduce its dependency on China. Under the act, the U.S. Department of the Interior is “to evaluate the global supply and ownership of critical minerals” and to establish “a process to assist U.S. companies seeking to divest critical minerals operations in foreign countries”. Concretely, this means that under the act, “a U.S. entity seeking to divest” can notify and seek assistance from the Secretary of the Interior to find “another purchaser that is not under the control of a foreign entity of concern”. The act also places the U.S. Department of the Interior in charge of “developing a method for sharing intellectual property for clean mining and processing technologies with U.S. allies and partners”.
🌱 What is the Critical Material Transparency and Reporting of Advanced Clean Energy (TRACE) Act?
The act was brought as a bipartisan bill. It focuses on transparency, accountability, and the recycling of EV batteries. It concretely “aims to improve the transparency and reporting mechanisms within the advanced energy technology sector”. Under the act, the source and destination of materials will have to be reported. Thereby, the act aims to “help identify and address challenges in global supply chains that may impact energy security”.
🌱 What does it say on human rights and labour standards?
The act strives to create “stronger markets for supply chains that advance best environmental, human rights, and labor practices”. The overall aim is to create the conditions needed for a just transition by safeguarding human rights and health throughout supply chains. The act specifically aims to “help protect human rights and uphold high labor and environmental standards” by improving transparency. Through increased transparency, the act also aims to foster conditions under which “ethical and sustainable practices” will be followed. The overall goal is to create “a cleaner and more accountable critical mineral supply chain”.
🌱 What is the Advanced Energy Technology Supply Chain Transparency Program?
The program is to be established under the Critical Material TRACE Act and be overseen by the Secretary of Energy. Under the program, “voluntary digital battery identification systems” will be developed and adopted. The identification systems aim “to enhance accurate and robust implementation” of the Clean Vehicle Tax Credit under the Inflation Reduction Act. The aim is to create conditions under which the reuse of batteries and materials will become safer, more sustainable, and more practical. Additionally, there is the aim to decrease the dependency on suppliers “implicated in human rights violations, labor abuses, and environmental degradation in the extraction and refining of critical materials”.
Read more about the proposed laws here:
- https://houlahan.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=3885