Kinshasa’s hopes and the coming cobalt crunch

Kinshasa’s hopes and the coming cobalt crunch

The energy transition is seen as marking a shift away from the “bad old” habits of the fossil fuel industry, but accessing the strategic resources pose their own often-overlooked problems.

These new resources, such as cobalt, lithium and manganese, are essential to cutting emissions and limiting climate change. But new developments pose their own challenges, which may yet come to hamper uptake of alternative resources.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has suggested demand for minerals to support the energy transition will double to 2040. If the world took the steps required to limit warming to less than 2 degrees Celsius, demand for these minerals would quadruple.