In the Stated Policies Scenario (STEPS), described in the International Energy Agency report Global Critical Minerals Outlook 2025, the demand for lithium will grow fivefold from today to 2040.
Graphite and nickel demand will double, while demand for cobalt and rare earth elements also grows strongly, increasing 50-60% by 2040.
The report says that, overall, supplies of some key energy minerals are on track to meet projected demand.
Copper and lithium are major exceptions where the expected mined supply from announced projects falls short of projected demand in 2035. The implied deficits are 30% for copper and 40% for lithium in the STEPS.
The supply gap for copper is particularly concerning due to declining ore grades, rising project costs and a sharp slowdown in new resource discoveries.
The expected nickel and cobalt supply could cover demand in the STEPS in 2035. Rare earth elements appear to be sufficiently supplied in 2035.
The dominating position of China for lithium, cobalt, graphite and rare earths, and Indonesia for nickel, form a geopolitical problem for western companies.
For graphite and rare earth elements, the remaining supplies would cover only 35-40% of the predicted demand in 2035.
For nickel, the supply covers less than 55% of the demand, but the ratio would be much lower if battery-grade nickel sulphate supplies (mostly from China) were also disrupted.
For lithium and cobalt, the gap is less stark, but it still covers only 65% of demand for both.
Copper is the only critical mineral where the supply almost covers the demand, as China is the largest consumer of refined copper as well as its leading supplier.
A successful scale-up of recycling can lower the need for new mining activity by 5-30% by 2040.
