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Fifield Termination Update and Scandium Drilling to Commence
October 16, 2024
Rimfire Pacific Mining Limited (Rimfire or the Company) (ASX: RIM) provides the following update in respect of the termination of the Fifield Project Earn-in Agreement.
As previously disclosed:
1 the Company has terminated the Fifield Project Earn-in Agreement with Golden Plains Resources Pty Ltd (GPR) (see Rimfire ASX Announcement dated 26 September 2024); and
2 GPR disputed the termination and made an application to the Supreme Court of Victoria for an order (among others) that Rimfire be prevented from acting on its termination of the Fifield Earn-in Agreement (see Rimfire ASX Announcement dated 3 October 2024).
GPR’s application was heard by the Court on 16 October 2024, and resulted in:
- Rimfire agreeing to provide a revocable undertaking that it will not dispose of, create any encumbrance over or dissipate the Fifield Project or any mined product. The undertaking is an interim measure until it is varied by the Court or an arbitrator, or is revoked by Rimfire, or the dispute is finally determined by arbitration; and
- GPR being required to issue a notice of arbitration to determine the validity of the termination of the Fifield Project Earn-in Agreement by 23 October 2024.
The undertaking does not preclude Rimfire from carrying on exploration activities (including the currently proposed drilling) to advance the Fifield Project.
Rimfire’s exploration team has secured an aircore rig to drill an initial 50-hole (1,500 metre) program at the Murga Scandium Exploration Target commencing next Wednesday (23 October 2024).
The aircore holes will be solely funded by Rimfire and will infill existing 400m x 400m spaced holes and are part of a larger drilling program that will resume next month when the drill rig becomes available again.
The drilling is intended to support the conversion of the Murga Scandium Exploration Target of 100 to 200Mt at 100 to 200ppm Sc* (15 – 46Kt Sc Oxide) (See Rimfire ASX Announcement dated 9 September 2024**) into a Mineral Resource Estimate.
Click here for the full ASX Release
This article includes content from Rimfire Pacific Mining Limited, licensed for the purpose of publishing on Investing News Australia. This article does not constitute financial product advice. It is your responsibility to perform proper due diligence before acting upon any information provided here. Please refer to our full disclaimer here.
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11 October
Rimfire Pacific Mining
Company Overview
Rimfire Pacific Mining (ASX:RIM) has its roots in NSW with a long history of exploration activity within some of the world's most prolific mining jurisdictions in Central Western NSW and the Broken Hill districts. With a highly capable and accomplished technical team, the company is committed to employing best-in-class geoscience to discovery Australia's next critical minerals mines.
With a combination of 100% owned assets and JV projects, Rimfire's Lachlan Orogen Projects are on the doorstep of some of Australia's truly great gold-copper porphyry mines such as Northparkes, Cadia and Cowal within a region dominated by major international mining businesses.
In the iconic Broken Hill region which has been a major production centre for base metals, Rimfire is primarily focused on chasing up historical occurrences of cobalt mineralisation and has projects proximate to ASX listed Cobalt Blue Ltd's Broken Hill Cobalt Project.
As a company committed to the discovery of critical minerals orebodies of scale, Rimfire aims to deliver enduring value to shareholders.
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6h
Maximising value from critical minerals, battery metals and black mass: Metso’s Duncan Wyatt
‘We aim to create solutions to accelerate sustainability in the industries we operate in’
Duncan Wyatt is an internationally respected voice in the mineral process engineering and technology arena. Currently critical minerals and hydrometallurgical solutions director at Metso, he will bring valuable insights to discussions about sustainable processing of critical minerals and battery metals to this month’s IMARC in Sydney.
Richard Roberts, Mining Beacon editor, caught up with him ahead of the event.
Richard Roberts: You’ve been around the mineral processing industry for more than 30 years, starting in Tasmania (Renison tin), then South Australia (Geologics) before plus-20 years with Outotec in Australia and Canada. Now Metso for the past four years in Perth. Have you seen enough of the world, or do you still enjoy the travel part of working in mining?
Duncan Wyatt: When I first left Tasmania the travel aspect was certainly very appealing. I have been fortunate to have visited too many countries to count and every continent except Antarctica, although I did consider a one-year break to work on an Antarctic research project aligned with Tasmanian University before I moved to South Australia.
More than the travel it has been the people I have met at various mine sites and companies that have been the highlight. The Australian mining sector is very large but within it there are many connected communities and talented people.
Richard Roberts: Speaking of change, Australia has become the global supply hub for lithium minerals in recent years. What have been the most significant, or impactful, changes you’ve seen in the lithium and related processing arenas?
Duncan Wyatt: Yes, it has been a profound and rapid change. I was involved with mineral processing projects at both Greenbushes and Wodgina in the mid-90s but at that time tin and tantalum were the target minerals and spodumene was either rejected or less commercially viable.
However, the surge in personal electronic devices which oddly enough drove the demand for tin and tantalum also created the impetus for lithium usage to become widespread. Starting in 1985 with the development by Akira Yoshino, a Japanese chemist, of the first lithium battery technology, Sony began commercialisation for its range of products.
By the 1990s Greenbushes had begun supplying lithium to China for the production of lithium hydroxide for batteries. It is the latest surge in consumer demand that has driven the recent developments, with EV cars requiring an order of magnitude larger lithium battery than the personal electronic devices that started the industry.
Now battery-grade lithium hydroxide is produced here in Western Australia using local spodumene as a lithium source. Metso has been at the forefront of optimising the downstream processing of spodumene to lithium hydroxide. The Metso leach process is environmentally sustainable: acid and sulphate free, without undesired crystallised salts or by-products, producing inert and neutral mineral residue for re-use or disposal.
Richard Roberts: On the very topical battery materials/black mass recycling – or urban mining – front, what has most caught your attention, in terms of technology development, market trends, etc, in the past 2-3 years, and why?
Duncan Wyatt: Recycling of lithium batteries is an emerging field which has struggled for a commercial basis due to a number of factors. Feedstock quality and variability, as well as future trends for different lithium battery chemistries that would require alternative recycling process routes, have made this process challenging.
In the Asia Pacific region several companies in South Korea and China are utilising manufacturing scrap, which is material that has not made it through the rigorous EV lithium battery manufacturing process, as their main source of feed. These companies are typically EV manufacturers or strategically linked, with facilities local to their partner.
Metso technologies for solvent extraction, which play a key role in the recycling of black mass, are beginning to penetrate the processing space due to their highly efficient unit processes and based off our know-how in the field, which is centred around our R&D team in Pori, Finland. Our recent work with battery-grade nickel, cobalt and manganese producers has reduced recycling, MHP, or nickel matte processing stages from over 100 to between 20-30 using Metso technologies and know-how.
This trend away from traditional local processing designs and basic equipment is driven by commercial realities, focusing on total cost of ownership, including plant footprint, power and services requirements as well as operational costs. Complex processing facilities with too many processing stages also require expensive solvent extraction chemicals.
Richard Roberts: Battery black mass recycling is quickly emerging as a vital process for the future. “This is such a fast-moving field that it’s hard to predict the future,” says Metso’s Madeleine Scheidema. What sort of challenges/opportunities does this rate of change present?
Duncan Wyatt: The rapidly changing landscape of battery chemistry means we must be agile to meet the market needs and in particular those of our clients both new and existing. The challenge is to tackle the issues at hand while constantly looking to future trends to ensure our know-how and capabilities lead the sector.
Richard Roberts: Metso obviously inherited some technologies and process know-how through its merger with Outotec. Is it fair to say some of this tech/know-how has increased in value – given the range/weight of applications – and continues to grow in value?
Duncan Wyatt: Certainly, as an alternative to smelting, hydrometallurgical processing can be an option. Metso’s hydrometallurgical know-how in pressure leaching using proprietary autoclave designs as well as BIOX based leaching processes are leading the way in processing of both complex gold and copper deposits as well as historical tailings deposits.
Downstream, our solvent extraction technologies and processing design capabilities are driving our entry into the businesses that are central to the energy transition and EV manufacturing, as well as base metals applications for copper, nickel, cobalt and zinc. We hope our existing clients can benefit from these advancements and that our new clients, aiming to stay competitive in the circular energy transition economy, also benefit. With our purpose to enable sustainable modern life, we aim to create solutions to accelerate sustainability in the industries we operate in.
Richard Roberts: What has happened to pilot and other testing levels at Pori and other Metso facilities – specifically in these alkaline leach process, lithium hydroxide process and mineral/metal recycling areas – over the past, say, five years?
Duncan Wyatt: As I said, our know-how in Pori is paramount to both our ability to develop novel processes for these many new downstream processing routes key to battery manufacturing and recycling, as well as utilisation of more complex base and precious metal ore bodies. Our bench-scale and piloting facilities give us an great competitive advantage. One area where this is illustrated is in the new demonstration scale pilot plant to support Metso’s new pCAM Reactor and associated plant. The production of NCM [nickel, cobalt and manganese) based cathodes for lithium-based EV batteries make up about 50% of the world’s lithium battery requirements.
Metso has developed a proprietary reactor and associated process that we believe provides a more sustainable route to produce these key pre-cursor materials for the cathode manufacturing process.
Our demonstration scale plant at Pori enables clients developing plants worldwide to trial chemistries and pCAM product specifications to support commercialisation, knowing that Metso will remain their processing partner through concept demonstration, financial investment decision and project execution.
Richard Roberts: How much activity are you seeing in the next few years?
Duncan Wyatt: Activity in copper and gold is forecast to be high, with battery material lifting by the end of 2028. At Metso our activity level is always high. The project cycle is significant for many of these new process routes and associated projects - a lot of work is ongoing with testing, studies and plant designs.
Richard Roberts: Where, geographically, are you seeing high, or increasing, levels of activity? Are the drivers the same or different?
Duncan Wyatt: The adoption of EV cars in the Asia Pacific region is leading the world, with countries like Thailand seeing extraordinary acceleration in take-up rates. We know that this rate of adoption will fuel local interest in battery materials and recycling, and we are committed to offer our services in these regions where demand presents.
Richard Roberts: Obviously upfront cost/lifecycle costs are going to affect adoption rates, but what is separating the leading technologies in the market today from a design/performance point of view?
Duncan Wyatt: Whilst many are keen to enter the market, we have seen some companies make missteps either in underestimating the demanding requirements to produce battery grade end-products, or in the costs to execute projects and ramp them up to produce end-products compliant with the demanding specifications of the industry.
Looking solely at the upfront or “equipment costs” in isolation undervalues the presence of a major partner during the process development, implementation and optimisation stages of any project. Metso’s global footprint, resources and know-how hopefully provide the value proposition that will see us partner with many in this significant market sector in the near term and for many years to come.
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18h
Massive Antimony Sulphide Stibnite Confirmed
Bindi Metals Limited (ASX: BIM, “Bindi” or the “Company”) is pleased to announce an exploration update on the recently acquired Mutnica and Lisa Antimony Projects in Serbia.
Mutnica Antimony-Copper Project:
- Fieldwork commenced successfully locating antimony occurrences at the Kreva Prospect
- 5m wide zone of outcropping variable stibnite-arsenopyrite veins observed at Kreva, including a zone of 5-20% massive antimony stibnite minerals
- Surface rock chip and 2023 soil samples submitted to assay antimony and associated metals
Lisa Antimony-Gold Project:
- Engagement of legal team to facilitate fast tracking of licence grant
Figure 1 Photographs of recent Bindi samples at Kreva 1 (left) Sample DM014022 displaying 5-20% massive stibnite (antimony sulphide mineral; st); (right) Sample DM014024 displaying 1-2% disseminated stibnite (st)
NB: Visual estimates of mineral abundance should never be considered a proxy or substitute for laboratory analyses where concentrations or grades are the factor of principal economic interest. Visual estimates also potentially provide no information regarding impurities or deleterious physical properties relevant to valuations
Bindi Metals Director, Eddie King said:
“We are pleased to have hit the ground running confirming impressive antimony potential at Mutnica and to continue the work Apollo Minerals started on an interesting copper target. In addition, we have formally engaged with in-country advisors to facilitate granting of the Lisa Antimony-Gold Project which was the focus on the transaction with Apollo and considered our key focus in Serbia.”
Mutnica Antimony-Copper Project Update
A team of local Serbian geologists as well as Bindi’s Australian geologist team are undertaking a field campaign around the historical antimony occurrences at Kreva and regional prospecting on the Mutnica licence. The aim of the work was to relocate the historical antimony occurrences that were reported in 2014 (see ASX BIM announcement dated 19 September 2024) and assess the economic significance of these outcrops. Priority samples have been sent to the SGS laboratory in Bor for rush assay on antimony, multi-element and gold assay.
The results of this fieldwork are highly encouraging and the historical Kreva 1 antimony occurrence was successfully located. The area is characterised by intermittent outcrop of vuggy quartz breccia with visible variable 1-5% stibnite (antimony sulphide) together with arsenopyrite (1%) in places. The outcropping zone appears to be approximately 5m wide in thickness but evidence for further antimony sulphide was exposed over a 50m strike zone of intermittent outcrop and open undercover with a dominant northwest to north strike. A standout outcrop was observed in what appears to be a core area of massive stibnite where 5-20% stibnite was observed (Figure 1).
Click here for the full ASX Release
This article includes content from Bindi Metals, licensed for the purpose of publishing on Investing News Australia. This article does not constitute financial product advice. It is your responsibility to perform proper due diligence before acting upon any information provided here. Please refer to our full disclaimer here.
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21h
Nova High Grade Gold Target Reached
Kaiser Reef Limited ("Kaiser" or "the Company") is pleased to announce that the decline at the high-grade A1 Gold Mine has successfully reached the Nova Zone at the extremities of the historic mining. This marks a milestone for Kaiser, signalling a new chapter in the Company’s operations with miners having focused on extracting “remnant” ore for the past 30 years.
The A1 Gold Mine, has operated almost continuously since 1861, and historically produced approximately 800 ounces of gold per vertical metre, with some levels exceeding 1,000 ounces per vertical metre, a benchmark for significant gold mines. Most of the ore was exploited in the first 100 year mining phase. Modern remnant mining over the past 30 years however has been limited to producing less than 237 ounces per vertical metre.
Kaiser has now reached a critical target, termed the "Nova Zone," which has never been mined before:
✓ Reached new previously unmined levels
✓ The best ore is now in-situ and not historically exploited
✓ Facilitates modern mine planning for increased production
✓ Power Systems Upgraded
✓ Ventilation Works Upgraded/Ongoing
✓ Mineralisation Open at Depth
✓ Diamond Drilling Imminent
Significant capital expenditure, estimated at over $24 million, including supporting infrastructure, has been invested to reach these new levels. The transition to mining the primary ore, with the best material not having been previously mined, and access to the potentially substantially higher “ounces per vertical meter” enjoyed historically is a major achievement (Figure 1 and 2). Additionally, substantial upgrades to the infrastructure— including enhanced ventilation and high-voltage power systems—have been implemented to support the development work at the mine
Click here for the full ASX Release
This article includes content from Kaiser Reef, licensed for the purpose of publishing on Investing News Australia. This article does not constitute financial product advice. It is your responsibility to perform proper due diligence before acting upon any information provided here. Please refer to our full disclaimer here.
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15 October
India ‘our most consequential energy relationship’: Geoffrey Pyatt
Assistant secretary at the US Department of State, Geoffrey Pyatt has signalled growing recognition of the need for urgency in busting through “regulatory and policy impediments on both sides” of the country’s nascent energy alliance with India – “overall … our most consequential energy relationship in the world” – as it seeks to counter China’s global strategic minerals dominance.
Indicating it’s “going to take … senior level government direction” to help speed the mobilisation of private capital to create and scale strategic mineral value chains in India and the US, Pyatt said India’s recent decision to join the Mineral Security Partnership (MSP), its Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD) connection and the longer-standing United States – India Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology (iCET) pact were all means to enabling vital high-level “critical minerals … policy conversation, but [also] practical collaboration”.
“The whole idea behind the iCET framework was to create an initiative led from the White House and the [Indian] prime minister’s office … which would drive our bureaucracy and help to identify the regulatory and policy impediments on both sides,” Pyatt said on a webcast hosted by the Washington, DC-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
“In the US-India context both bureaucracies often compete with each other to see who can be more difficult sometimes in dealing with these issues.
“But what’s happened now is you have a directive from the prime minister [India’s Narendra Modi], from [US] president Biden, driven by the two national security advisors, basically saying to the rest of us in the bureaucracy, you guys figure this out, because it’s really, really important to our national security interests.
“Everybody knows we’ve got to make permitting happen faster and we have to generate significantly increased volumes of these materials. The option of saying we’re just going to leave it in the ground really isn’t there anymore.
“We have to figure out how to do this in a way that’s sustainable, that meets the test of our democracies, but also delivers the outputs that we need in order to escape this dependency on China.”
Pyatt pointed to the example of QUAD country companies Lynas Rare Earths of Australia and Japan’s JOGMEC of what could be achieved in the strategically important rare earths business, where Chinese state-backed enterprises control about 90% of global RE processing.
“The fundamental issue is the concentration of processing,” Pyatt said.
“This is where we see a much greater role that India could play … because many of these rare earths are both energy minerals, which is what I’m responsible for, but also products with extensive defence applications.
“We’ve got to think about cobalt, lithium, nickel, zinc, copper [and] rare earths the same way we thought about crude oil and gas as being an essential attribute of US national security, where we need to ensure that we are not vulnerable to the instrumentalisation of those resources by our adversaries.
“That’s what MSP is all about. That’s why the partnership with India on these issues is so fundamental.
“You can look at the example with Lynas in Australia and the investments made by JOGMEC ... It took the kind of patient capital that JOGMEC brought to the table to help Lynas work its way through the valley of death in the investment cycle.
“We need to figure out how to crack that problem in the US-India context.
“I can’t tell you who’s going to be the company that’s going to figure out how to scale rare earths processing in India but in an environment … where we are very much behind the eight ball, with the concentration of processing capacity in China, it’s going to take … senior level government direction to make it happen.
“Most importantly, how do we lay track for our companies?
“Everything that I work on in ENR [Bureau of Energy Resources] is going to be driven by the private sector, or it’s not going to go.
“All of our countries depend on the market driven decisions that our companies are going to make in terms of allocating capital and then mobilising our private sectors to deliver a value proposition for their shareholders, but also to advance our national security interests.
“What we’ve tried to do as the US government, and especially my team at ENR, is provide an enabling environment for that private sector led investment and private sector led growth.”
Pyatt’s long government career included a stint at the US embassy in New Delhi when bilateral trade between the two countries was, according to former ambassador Robert Blackwell, as “flat as a chapati”.
“It’s really exciting to see how it’s all puffed up now like a big poori,” Pyatt said.
“One of the largest line items in that overall bilateral trade relationship is energy products.
“That says a lot about both the huge energy demand that is expanding very, very quickly in India, but also the leadership shown by American companies.
“You have Indian firms making significant investments here in the United States in the energy transition, critical minerals [and] battery space, [which] is a really revealing indicator of how this conversation is changing. We see India not just as a partner in terms of what it's doing at home, but also as a country that is ideally suited to partner with the United States globally, as we seek to grow those supply chains.
“I was saying to one of my State Department bosses the other day that any time I get challenged by the bureaucratic impediments that we manage to place on the US-India relationship, both in Washington and Delhi, the cure for that is to go out to the states and see how fast things are happening [in] ... Mumbai, Hyderabad, Chennai, Bangalore, Ahmedabad.
“The thing that has changed most about India [in the past 15-to-20 years] is the rise of global Indian companies [such as] Tata, Reliance, Adani, who are present across the developing world, who behave just like American multinationals and are fantastic partners for US companies looking to achieve that kind of supply chain diversification.
“What's really interesting is so many of these Indian companies … weren't even on the map when I was living in Delhi [up to 2007] and are now worth billions of dollars. Almost all of these companies have a CEO who went to school in the United States, who has an MBA from Wharton or Stanford or went to MIT, then went home to grow their business.
“There’s a fundamental alignment between our countries, which means I do not see a likely scenario where Indian companies are head-to-head competitors with Americans; much more likely as they are going to be collaborators.”
US investment bank Morgan Stanley says power demand in India that has been growing at circa-5% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) over the past two decades could now be growing at c8%pa and “is set to remain strong over the next decade or so”.
“Importantly, generation companies have seen significant government support in terms of policy making and ease of doing business, with commodity price pass through featuring in contracts allowing risk mitigation for generators,” bank analysts said on the bank of an India tour last month.
“For power generation growth targets there has been a strong tilt towards renewables.
“Though thermal power demand is set to stay robust there is more focus on renewables, supported by the government’s decarbonisation goals.
“From our feedback India’s share of renewables should increase from 43% in FY24 to 65% in FY32. As such, renewables feature in growth plans for key construction-led sectors, with some players targeting more than 50% of power needs to be met by green energy by the end of this decade.”
Morgan Stanley said India’s nuclear power demand could grow from c8GW to c20GW by 2032.
Meanwhile, the country’s target of reaching 300 million tonnes per annum of steel production capacity by 2030 “is both achievable and sensible given current rates of growth being experienced in the nation”.
“India aluminium demand is expected to remain strong at high single digits, driving demand at about 9Mt by 2033 versus c4.5Mt currently, based on our feedback,” the bank said.
“India has built about 100,000km of roads in the past 10 years and the government is targeting another c100,000km of highways to be constructed within the next 6-7 years.
“We understand that the government policies are now much more supportive for private players' participation, including risk mitigation measures built into the contracts.
“Feedback suggests port capacity could move from c2600Mtpa now to c10,000Mtpa by 2047.
“Though small, our feedback suggests focus remains on privatising port capacity in the country: 500Mtpa done [so far]; another 500Mtpa expected over the next decade.”
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Geoffrey Pyatt
Assistant Secretary of State for Energy Resources
US Department of State
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15 October
Achilles Launches MyAchilles App for Mining Suppliers
We are excited to share the latest news from Achilles with you. Today, we announced the launch of our new MyAchilles App, a powerful tool designed to help mining suppliers manage sustainability and compliance with greater ease and efficiency.
The MyAchilles App offers suppliers mobile access to their Achilles Sustainability Scores and key performance insights, empowering them to stay ahead of evolving sustainability standards while managing their profiles on the go. This innovative app provides real-time notifications, performance updates, and access to important documents and certificates, all from a mobile device.
In addition, more advanced features such as audit reports and improvement actions will be rolled out in the coming months to further support suppliers in managing compliance and driving improvements. You can find the full press release attached for more detailed information.
If you have any questions or would like to arrange an interview with a spokesperson from Achilles, please don't hesitate to reach out: arya.nair@achilles.com
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15 October
Materials ‘green’ premia: Trends and outlook to 2030
‘By 2030 the buyers we surveyed expect demand for green materials to increase by 1.7-to-4.5-times current levels’
Christian Hoffmann, Michel Van Hoey and Oleksandr Kravchenko*
The supply of green commodities, as well as demand for them, has been growing significantly over recent years, although volumes of these premium-priced materials remain limited. Numerous producers of metals, plastics, glass, and other materials have launched low CO2 or recovered and recycled offerings for which they have been charging “green premia”.
In addition, information providers such as S&P Global Platts and Fastmarkets MB have defined criteria for green materials and introduced indexes that track green premia across various commodities. Long-term offtake contracts for green materials are also starting to emerge.
However, this growth has been facing headwinds since the second half of 2021. An uncertain macroeconomic outlook, high energy costs and interest rates and declining carbon costs, among other factors, have spurred fears of slowing demand for green materials and delays in decarbonisation projects.
What impact will these potential shifts have on green premia?
To answer this question we surveyed more than 100 buyers and suppliers of seven materials – steel, aluminium, copper, nickel, lithium, plastics, and glass – from around the world. Their responses suggest that despite the challenges the green momentum remains strong across commodities and regions.
Respondents report strong recent demand and premia for green materials
More than 90% of respondents, both buyers and sellers, report stable or growing demand for green materials over the past 12 months, with results largely consistent across regions and materials categories. More than 80% of respondents also observe stable or even increased green premia over that time.
By 2030, demand for green materials could increase by up to 4.5 times
While the volume of green commodities remains relatively small survey respondents have embraced sustainable offerings. The current share of green materials in respondents’ purchases ranges from 9% and 12% for battery-grade lithium and nickel, respectively, to 23% for plastics.
By 2030 the buyers we surveyed expect their demand for green materials to increase by between 1.7 and 4.5-times current levels, depending on the commodity, suggesting that they remain committed to decarbonisation in the medium to long term. This projected increase is fuelled by companies’ commitments to reducing Scope 3 emissions as well as rising demand from their end users. As a result we expect green materials’ share of total purchases to range from approximately one-quarter for copper to more than 40% for steel, plastics, and battery materials. Buyers in the automotive, construction, energy equipment, and consumer-packaged-goods (CPG) sectors account for the bulk of these increases.
Definitions of green materials are expected to become more stringent
In addition to higher future demand our survey suggests that definitions of what constitutes “green” offerings will become more stringent for all seven materials. By 2030, 57% of respondents expect to include suppliers’ Scope 3 emissions in their criteria for green materials, up from 48% today. The definitions of low-carbon footprint are also likely to change. For example, almost half of the steel producers and buyers we surveyed expect the definition to require less than 0.3 tonnes1 of total CO2 emissions per tonne of steel by 2030, up from 16% who view that as the criterion today. For aluminium, 29% expect less than 0.5t of total CO2 emissions per tonne of aluminium to qualify as green by 2030, up from 12% currently.
Green premia vary widely between sectors and regions
The majority of the buyers we surveyed are currently paying premia for green materials. However, there is high variation in the levels of the premia they report. These disparities may be because of limited information and benchmark data on green commodity prices that can guide buyer expectations and different levels of willingness to pay premia among sectors and companies. On a regional level, European markets have consistently higher green premia than North American ones, but the gap is expected to narrow by 2030 for most commodities. Nevertheless, most respondents don’t anticipate significant increases in green premia in the coming years. Notably, relatively few respondents expect no premia at all in 2030.
Price elasticity varies across commodities
Nearly 60% of survey respondents say that by 2030 they would be willing to pay additional premia to secure supplies of scarce green materials. Some segments of buyers report higher readiness to pay green premia than their overall industries. For example, CPG companies are willing to pay extra for green plastics and glass, while automotive and energy equipment producers will accept higher premia for green base metals. Such variation highlights the importance of laser-sharp customer segmentation when offering green materials.
Implications for commodities suppliers
Capitalising on green materials to gain higher revenue and market share requires focused strategies, as green premia are unlikely to be effective in every market and customer segment. Materials suppliers should develop their approaches from demand backward across four dimensions:
- Re-evaluate the business case for decarbonisation and its pace. This should include an assessment of the need for subsidies and external financing, as premia may not be enough to cover the high capital and operating costs associated with decarbonisation.
- Prioritise market segments and individual customers with the highest unmet demand, willingness to pay, and interest in offtake contracts, and address the demand in these segments with tailored offerings.
- Increase the transparency of operations and supply chains to prove the sustainability of your offerings by, for example, tracking and verifying emissions at a granular level, including Scope 3. Such a forward-looking approach can prepare you for potential future regulatory requirements.
- Secure the raw materials and energy supplies early to meet your decarbonisation goals as these supplies may become scarce. To do so producers should develop and implement sourcing strategies for sustainable raw materials, energy, and technology.
Our experience suggests that sustainability remains a business imperative and should be a C-suite priority for materials producers and customers alike.
The new survey supports this view.
Despite macroeconomic headwinds, buyers’ demand for green materials is steady or growing, as is their willingness to pay premia to secure those commodities. However, producers should prepare for a likely tightening of standards in the definitions of green materials. Collaboration across value chains will be essential to ensure that businesses are both environmentally and economically sustainable.
*Christian Hoffmann is a partner in McKinsey’s Dusseldorf office; Michel Van Hoey is senior partner in Luxembourg; and Oleksandr Kravchenko is managing partner in Kyiv.
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