The Biden administration’s “rush-to-green energy policies” designed to create a “net-zero carbon power sector” by 2035 are causing economic upheaval and making the United States reliant on imported minerals and products, including from China, several witnesses warned during nearly 10 hours of hearings before House committees Feb. 7-9 in Washington.
While “promising utopia,” critics say the administration is steaming ahead in pushing electric vehicles (EVs), for instance, without a domestic supply chain to support it, inducing demand for imported lithium and EV batteries.
China controls more than 80 percent of the global markets for raw lithium and batteries, making the Chinese Communist Party among beneficiaries of Biden’s energy policies, witnesses and Republican panel members agreed.
Meanwhile, the demand for minerals key to emerging technologies is set to explode by 2040. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), demand for lithium will grow 40 times; for graphite, cobalt, nickel 20–25 times; for copper by 200 percent; with ‘‘rare earth elements’ to see three to seven times higher demand.
Many of these minerals—and much of the capacity to develop them—“are controlled by adversaries like China and Russia,” Rep. Bill Johnson (R-Ohio) said. “We cannot stake our future on certain technologies that then rely on our adversaries for the minerals and mineral-processing needed to develop them.”
“These ‘rush-to-green energy policies’ are unsustainable and lead to greater reliance on countries like Russia, or in our case, China,” House Energy & Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) said. “This is not a future any of us want.”
“The U.S. must focus on supplying these materials at home, as well as restoring domestic smelting, refining, and processing capabilities,” National Mining Association (NMA) Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Katie Sweeney said. “Mineral security is energy security.”
