Securing supplies of technology critical metals: Resource recycling and waste management

摘要

Globally many countries face major socio-economic and political challenges that include climate change, energy supply and availability of critical resources. Metals are essential to the products and modern technologies that will allow all economies (either developed or developing), a transition into the low carbon future. Technology metals, that include critical metals or more specifically Technology Critical Metals (TCMs), play a key role to this context with respect to the industrialized regions in the world. TCMs have immensely contributed to recent revolutionary developments in technology and energy efficiency. They are economically important and serve as essential raw materials for high-technology, green and defense related applications. The demand for TCMs including cobalt, nickel, lithium, vanadium, rare earth elements (REEs) etc. will increase, owing to their applications in green energy technologies, in order to keep global warming at a controllable level.