Doing so would add crucial minerals resembling lithium, nickel, graphite, cobalt and manganese to the checklist of things lined by the 1950 Protection Manufacturing Act, a legislation enacted amid the Korean Conflict that enables the president to make use of emergency authority to make massive orders of a sure sort of product or increase productive capability and provide.
The White Home will work carefully with the departments of Vitality and the Inside to implement the presidential willpower underneath the Protection Manufacturing Act, the supply mentioned, including {that a} presidential willpower signed by Biden would “on no account” bypass or supersede allowing or environmental overview processes for mining these minerals.
The supply additionally mentioned that the actions being thought-about aren’t loans or direct purchases for crucial minerals; as a substitute, they might fund feasibility research, co-product and by-product manufacturing at present operations, in addition to productiveness and security modernizations.
“China not solely leads the world in manufacture of lithium-ion batteries, but in addition within the processing of the minerals and uncooked supplies required in lithium-ion battery manufacturing,” the senators mentioned. “Our dependence on foreign-sourced cobalt and lithium is elevated because the processing of each is dominated by China.”
This story has been up to date to notice that the Intercept first reported the Biden administration was contemplating utilizing the Protection Manufacturing Act for this function.