Webinar — Prospects for Mining and Minerals Processing in the United States

Materials supply chains have come under closer scrutiny as experts evaluate ideas and plans for expanding alternative energy applications — many of which are materials-sensitive and would necessitate heavy competition with other industrial and consumer product and defense needs. The increased attention to and concerns about the integrity of materials supply chains have raised questions about the ability to achieve supply growth and new domestic capacity.

The view of many is that supply chain risks, including geopolitical tensions, might be alleviated through increased investment at home. However, the U.S. mining and minerals processing industries face the gamut of constraints that all extractive, natural resource businesses are grappling with, ranging from access to resources, including on federal and tribal lands, to workforce and environmental permitting and regulatory oversight. At this roundtable from the Energy, Minerals & Materials program, featured speakers Michelle Michot Foss, fellow in energy and minerals at the Baker Institute, and Michael Moats, director of the O'Keefe Institute for Sustainable Supply of Strategic Materials at Missouri S&T, surveyed the state of the U.S. industry and touched on the complexities and commercial hurdles involved with non-fuel minerals of interest.

The open webinar followed an invitation-only roundtable open to Energy Forum members with featured speakers Michot Foss and Moats as well as Katie Sweeney, executive vice president and general counsel for the National Mining Association, and Kathleen Benedetto, former special assistant to the U.S. secretary of the interior with the Bureau of Land Management.

This webinar was sponsored by the Baker Institute Center for Energy Studies. Follow @CES_Baker_Inst on Twitter, and join the conversation online with #BakerEnergy.