National Critical Minerals Mission: Mines Ministry seeks `34,300 crore for over 6 yrs

New Delhi: The Ministry of Mines has sought Rs 34,300 crores spread over six years for augmenting domestic availability of critical minerals that are essential for India’s transition to green energy, making batteries and electronics which are crucial for the country’s energy security as it races to meet its Net Zero carbon commitments.

Budget 2024 had announced a National Critical Minerals Mission to promote domestic exploration and production, to acquire mines abroad and to encourage recycling of critical minerals at home as limited domestic production, coupled with extreme import dependency on a handful of countries, created a supply risk that could disrupt the clean energy transition.

Out of the Mines Ministry’s budget, a large chunk — Rs 7,000 crores — is being sought for expansion of domestic mineral production where the target is to explore 1,200 sites for auction of 100 discovered critical mineral blocks by financial year 2029-2030.

Prime exploration focus would be on 15 critical minerals including graphite, lithium, potash and rare earth elements.

Rs 5,600 crores is being kept aside for acquisition of at least 50 overseas mineral assets focused on key battery minerals including lithium, nickel, copper, cobalt, and graphite. These acquisitions are expected to meet 5 percent of annual demand by 2030.

To foster a circular economy, the Mines Ministry has proposed a kitty of Rs 1,500 crores for a production linked incentive (PLI) scheme to encourage e-waste recycling, incentivize the production of recycled critical minerals and promote investments in advanced recycling technologies.

The Ministry aims to recycle at least 10 percent of the nation’s annual consumption of critical minerals such as lithium, cobalt, copper, graphite, and silicon to reduce the dependency on primary raw materials.

India imports 80 per cent of its lithium and 85 percent of its cobalt from China which is the world’s largest producer of critical minerals.

The mission will support 100 domestic research and development projects and international collaborations to advance innovation in extraction, processing, and recycling technologies to achieve self-sufficiency in the processing of at least 5 critical minerals and generating 1,000 patents by 2030. The budget for this has been kept at Rs 1,000 crores.

Rs 500 crores is being set aside for creation of a National Critical Mineral Stockpile comprising at least 5 critical minerals, designed to mitigate risks from global supply chain disruptions and to ensure that essential minerals are available to meet domestic needs during emergencies.

Besides the above, monies have been budgeted for creating 10,000 skilled professionals, specializing from mining and processing to recycling, creation of four regional mineral processing parks.