Industry Lexicon

A highly purified, white crystalline salt of tungsten and ammonium. It is the primary intermediate and the most globally traded form of tungsten before it is converted into powders or carbides.

Informal mining operations often conducted using manual labor and simple tools. Prominent in the Democratic Republic of the Congo for cobalt, ASM frequently raises severe ethical and ESG concerns due to child labor and poor safety conditions.

Commonly used, relatively abundant industrial metals such as copper, zinc, nickel, tin and lead; lower unit value than precious metals and widely used in construction, machinery and infrastructure.

Metals central to battery technologies: typically lithium, cobalt, nickel, manganese, natural graphite, sometimes also iron, phosphorus and others.

Situation where a critical metal is produced mainly as a by-product of another metal (e.g., indium from zinc, gallium from aluminum, silver from copper). Supply cannot be easily increased independently of the host metal's production.

Economic model emphasizing resource efficiency, reuse, repair and high-quality recycling to keep critical materials in circulation, reducing primary mining needs and supply risk.

High-purity nickel (typically ≥99.8% Ni) in the form of refined metal, briquettes, or powders. It is the required precursor feed to create nickel sulfate for electric vehicle battery cathodes.

Lower purity nickel products (typically 4-40% Ni), such as Nickel Pig Iron (NPI) or ferronickel. Used directly in the production of stainless steel.

Production of several metals from the same ore or process (e.g., copper, molybdenum, gold; or Ni, Cu, Co, PGMs), which ties their supply dynamics together and can limit flexible response to demand.

Metal obtained only or mainly as a by-product of other 'host' metals, similar to minor/by-product metal; its availability is constrained by the host metal's production.

Metal whose combination of economic importance, supply risk, lack of substitutes and recycling challenges makes it critical for modern technologies.

Often used interchangeably with CRM; a mineral or material vital for key technologies and national interests, where supply chains face significant risk from concentration, geopolitics, or technical constraints.

Raw material considered essential to an economy and subject to high supply risk, usually assessed via criteria such as economic importance and supply risk.

A flagship European Union policy designed to ensure secure and sustainable supply chains for critical minerals. It mandates that by 2030, the EU must extract 10%, process 40%, and recycle 25% of its annual consumption of strategic raw materials.

An emerging set of technologies (including sorbents, resins, and membranes) designed to extract lithium directly from geothermal or oilfield brines in hours or days, bypassing the massive land footprint and multi-year timeline of traditional solar evaporation ponds.

Metric used in EU criticality assessments to quantify how essential a material is to the economy, often based on value added in downstream sectors using that material.

Metals needed for low-carbon technologies: e.g., copper, lithium, nickel, cobalt, manganese, graphite, rare earths, silver, PGMs, vanadium.

List of materials the EU deems critical, updated roughly every three years, based on economic importance and supply risk; includes many rare earths, battery metals, PGMs and others.

A designation used by the US government under the Inflation Reduction Act. If an EV battery contains components or critical minerals extracted, processed, or recycled by a FEOC (such as China or Russia), the vehicle is disqualified from federal tax credits.

Recovery of a metal from end-of-life products and its reuse in an application that exploits its original functional properties (e.g., recycling Nd from magnets into new magnets), as opposed to down-cycling to a lower-grade use.

A subgroup of rare earth elements (Atomic numbers 63-71, plus Yttrium) that are significantly scarcer and more expensive than light rare earths. Elements like Dysprosium (Dy) and Terbium (Tb) are critical for high-temperature permanent magnets.

A hydrometallurgical process used to extract nickel and cobalt from tropical laterite ores. The ore is leached with sulfuric acid at high temperatures and pressures. While it provides crucial battery materials, it is highly energy-intensive and presents severe tailings management challenges.

A landmark 2022 US law providing massive subsidies and tax credits for domestic clean energy deployment. Crucially, its Section 30D EV tax credit requires escalating percentages of battery minerals to be extracted or processed in the US or countries with a US Free Trade Agreement.

The more abundant subgroup of rare earth elements (Atomic numbers 57-62, plus Lanthanum and Cerium). Includes Neodymium (Nd) and Praseodymium (Pr), the primary ingredients in high-strength permanent magnets.

A battery cathode chemistry (LiFePO₄) that contains zero nickel or cobalt. It offers lower cost, excellent thermal safety, and extremely long cycle life, though at the expense of lower energy density compared to NMC.

Overall assessment of how 'critical' a material is, typically combining economic importance, supply risk, recycling limits, co-product dependence and environmental impacts into an index.

Replacing a critical material with another material or technology that provides similar functionality, to reduce supply risk or environmental impact.

Measure of how diversified or concentrated supply of a mineral is across countries and companies; higher diversity generally implies lower supply risk.

Metals produced mainly as by-products of major base-metal mining (e.g., gallium from bauxite/aluminum, indium from zinc, germanium from zinc/coal), typically with small markets but high tech importance.

An intermediate nickel-cobalt product typically produced via HPAL processing of laterite ores. It is rapidly becoming the preferred feedstock to produce high-purity nickel and cobalt sulfates for EV batteries.

A family of high-energy-density lithium-ion battery cathode chemistries. Often denoted by their metal ratios (e.g., NMC 811 means 8 parts nickel, 1 part manganese, 1 part cobalt). They are the dominant choice for long-range electric vehicles.

A low-grade ferronickel (Class 2 Nickel) invented in China as a cheaper alternative to pure nickel for the production of stainless steel. Driven heavily by Indonesian laterite mining.

Group of six noble metals: platinum, palladium, rhodium, ruthenium, iridium and osmium; used in autocatalysts, industrial catalysts, jewelry and electronics; often included on critical and strategic lists.

Rare, high-value metals like gold, silver and platinum (often extended to palladium and other PGMs), used in jewelry, investment, and high-tech applications due to corrosion resistance and specific functional properties.

A technology used in fuel cells and electrolyzers. PEM electrolyzers use electricity to split water into green hydrogen. They require highly specialized catalysts, predominantly relying on Platinum and Iridium.

Natural flake graphite that has been mechanically rounded (spheronized) and chemically purified to >99.95% carbon. It is the direct precursor material used to manufacture the anode in lithium-ion batteries. China controls over 90% of global PSG production.

Group of 17 chemically similar elements: lanthanides plus scandium and yttrium; crucial for magnets, catalysts, phosphors and many strategic technologies, often classified as critical raw materials.

Non-precious, relatively scarce metals (often low crustal abundance or few economic deposits) used in high-tech applications, e.g., rare earths, indium, gallium, germanium, niobium, tantalum.

A salt flat or dried salt lake. The salars in the 'Lithium Triangle' (Chile, Argentina, Bolivia) hold massive reserves of lithium-rich brine trapped in subsurface aquifers.

Materials recovered from waste streams (e.g., metals from e-waste, scrap, industrial residues) that can substitute primary raw materials; particularly important for critical and rare metals.

A pyroxene mineral consisting of lithium aluminum inosilicate. It is the world's primary source of hard-rock lithium, predominantly mined in Western Australia and shipped as a concentrate to be refined.

Composite index measuring how strategic a metal is for a sector, combining sector demand vs global production, resource adequacy vs cumulative demand, and supply risk.

Broad group of metals considered essential for national security, defense, aerospace, and green-energy industries, with limited current and future supply options.

Subset of important raw materials designated for their particular strategic relevance, for example to defense, energy transition or digital infrastructure; sometimes classified separately from 'critical' when supply risk is lower but strategic importance is very high.

Metric used to capture vulnerability of supply for a material, combining factors like production concentration, governance in producing countries, trade restrictions and substitutability.

Elements that are essential for modern and emerging technologies (electronics, renewables, advanced materials), often with limited substitutes and complex supply chains; typically overlaps with CRMs and strategic materials.

An engineering and manufacturing strategy to systematically reduce the amount of a critical or expensive material required per unit of output without sacrificing performance. Prominently seen in the reduction of silver paste in solar panels and cobalt in EV batteries.

Recovery of metals from anthropogenic stocks (e-waste, scrap, tailings, landfills, industrial residues) rather than from primary ores, often highlighted as a secondary source for CRMs.

List published by US agencies (USGS, DOE) of minerals critical to US national security and economy; includes many battery metals, rare earths, PGMs and others.