The Interior Department is proposing to add six mineral commodities to the list of critical minerals as part of the Trump administration’s effort to incentivize domestic production and processing of metals, minerals, and rare earth elements vital to the nation’s economy and national defense.
If adopted as proposed after a 30-day public comment period, the nation’s 2025 List of Critical Minerals will expand to 54 “mineral commodities” from 50 three years ago and 35 in 2018.
“Unfortunately, for some of these minerals, the U.S. is dependent on a small group of countries—both allies and geopolitical adversaries. This presents considerable risk in supply chain disruptions for many reasons including ... foreign government policies creating outright competitive disadvantages for U.S. companies.”
In the past month, the Energy Department announced that it would shift $1 billion from programs established under 2021’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and 2022’s Inflation Reduction Act into funding critical mineral projects. According to Reuters, the Trump administration is also considering reallocating at least $2 billion from the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act into critical mineral mining and processing.
A 2017 executive order issued by Trump requires the USGS, the Energy Department, the Defense Department, and the Interior Department to analyze and address the vulnerability of domestic supply chains for critical minerals. The Energy Act of 2020 requires the list to be updated every three years.
The 2025 three-year update was developed using a new methodology that assessed potential effects of more than 1,200 “trade disruption scenarios” involving 84 mineral commodities on 402 individual industries and the U.S. economy overall.
The modeled economic impacts were then weighted by the probability of the disruption scenario, according to the USGS.
USGS Acting Director Sarah Ryker said the proposed new draft list reflects “advances in forecasting potential mineral supply chain disruptions” that provide “a next generation risk assessment that can be used to prioritize securing the nation’s mineral supply chains.”
“Minerals-based industries contributed over $4 trillion to the U.S. economy in 2024, and with this methodology we can pinpoint which industries may feel the greatest impacts of supply disruptions and understand where strategic domestic investments or international trade relationships may help mitigate risk to individual supply chains,” she said.
The top 10 mineral commodities, in descending order by the estimated probability-weighted impact of supply disruptions on the U.S. economy, are samarium, rhodium, lutetium, terbium, dysprosium, gallium, germanium, gadolinium, tungsten, and niobium.
The Energy Act of 2020 gives the interior secretary broad authority to designate additional minerals for inclusion on the List of Critical Minerals.
Metallurgical coal and uranium are cited by the Trump administration as preferred entries on the list, and “the USGS intends to analyze and provide information to the secretary on the potential for including them on the 2025 List of Critical Minerals,” the agency stated.
The Interior Department encouraged Americans to make their views known during the 30-day comment period.
“Public comment is specifically welcomed on inclusion of metallurgical coal and uranium, whether other minerals should be added,” it stated.
Burgum said in the statement that the proposed list “provides a clear, science-based roadmap to reduce our dependence on foreign adversaries, expand domestic production and unleash American innovation.”
“By working with industry and state partners, we are ensuring that the minerals powering our energy, defense, and technology supply chains are produced and processed in the United States by American workers,” he said.
