India's energy transition may create new import dependence on critical minerals: CII-EY
A joint report by an industry body and a consultancy finds that India's clean-energy transition could create a new dependence on imported critical minerals even as it reduces reliance on imported fossil fuels
The report identifies India as fully import-dependent for 15 of the 23 critical energy-transition minerals assessed, including lithium, cobalt, nickel, silicon, rare earth elements, gallium, germanium, and platinum group elements
It highlights extreme global concentration in mineral processing, led by one country, which dominates refining capacity for several of these minerals
Cumulative Indian demand for key transition minerals — copper, graphite, silicon, phosphorus, and nickel — is projected to rise sharply between 2025 and 2070 as renewable energy, electric mobility, battery storage, and nuclear power expand
The report recommends India strengthen domestic exploration, processing, manufacturing, and recycling capacity to reduce these supply-chain vulnerabilities
Critical Minerals and India's National Critical Mineral Mission (NCMM)
"Critical minerals" are minerals essential for economic development and national security, whose supply is exposed to significant disruption risk, often because production or processing is concentrated in a few countries. A Ministry of Mines committee (constituted November 2022) identified a list of 30 critical minerals for India in 2023, of which 24 were subsequently notified in Part D of the First Schedule of the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act, 1957, giving the Union government exclusive authority to auction their mining and composite licences. The Union Cabinet approved the National Critical Mineral Mission in January 2025 with an outlay of ₹34,300 crore over seven years (FY2024–25 to FY2030–31) to secure this value chain, following its announcement in the Union Budget 2024-25 (23 July 2024).
Key Details
- 30 critical minerals identified for India (2023); 24 notified in Part D, First Schedule, MMDR Act, 1957 (as amended by the MMDR Amendment Act, 2023)
- National Critical Mineral Mission approved January 2025; outlay ₹34,300 crore over FY2024-25 to FY2030-31
- Geological Survey of India tasked with 1,200 exploration projects for critical minerals under the Mission (2024-25 to 2030-31)
- KABIL (Khanij Bidesh India Ltd, incorporated 2019) pursues overseas critical-mineral assets — e.g., a lithium exploration agreement with Argentina's CAMYEN SE (January 2024)
The CII-EY report's finding of near-total import dependence for minerals such as lithium, cobalt, and nickel is precisely the vulnerability the NCMM and the 2023 MMDR amendment were designed to address, by enabling faster domestic auction of critical-mineral blocks and funding exploration and overseas acquisition.
Global Processing Concentration and Supply-Chain Diversification
Even where a mineral is mined outside a single country, downstream refining and processing is heavily concentrated, meaning ore extraction alone does not resolve import dependence — a distinction important for understanding "resource security" versus "processing security." This concentration underpins global initiatives such as the Minerals Security Partnership (MSP, launched 2022, which India joined in 2023) that seek to diversify critical-mineral supply chains among like-minded countries.
Key Details
- Global refining share (2024, per the report): graphite refining ~93%, rare-earth processing ~85%, cobalt refining ~79%, lithium refining ~70%, nickel refining ~44% concentrated in one country
- Minerals Security Partnership (MSP): US-led plurilateral initiative (2022) to build diversified, secure critical-mineral supply chains; India is a partner country
- India's critical mineral demand (2025–2070 projection, per the report): copper >66 million tonnes, graphite ~46 million tonnes, silicon ~19.5 million tonnes, phosphorus ~16.7 million tonnes, nickel ~11.5 million tonnes
The report's China-dominance figures for refining illustrate why India's mineral strategy (NCMM, KABIL, MSP membership) must target processing and refining capacity, not just mining rights, to avoid simply substituting fossil-fuel import dependence with critical-mineral import dependence.
Clean Energy Transition and Mineral Intensity
Clean-energy technologies are significantly more mineral-intensive per unit of energy output than fossil-fuel-based generation — for example, an electric vehicle requires roughly six times the mineral inputs of a conventional car, and an onshore wind plant requires roughly nine times the mineral inputs of a similarly sized gas-fired plant (per International Energy Agency analysis). This mineral intensity is why energy-transition planning is increasingly linked to mineral-security planning.
Key Details
- IEA's "Critical Minerals" analysis has flagged that global demand for minerals used in clean energy (lithium, cobalt, nickel, graphite, rare earths, copper) is set to grow several-fold by 2040 under net-zero pathways
- India's own transition targets — 500 GW non-fossil-fuel capacity by 2030 (announced at COP26, 2021) and net-zero by 2070 — directly drive the mineral-demand projections cited in the report
- Battery storage, EV manufacturing, and grid infrastructure are the largest incremental consumers of these minerals within India's transition pathway
The report links India's own stated 2030 non-fossil and 2070 net-zero targets to the specific mineral-demand trajectory (2025–2070) it projects, framing critical-mineral security as inseparable from the pace of India's energy transition.
- India fully import-dependent for 15 of 23 assessed critical energy-transition minerals
- Minerals cited: lithium, cobalt, nickel, silicon, rare earth elements, graphite, phosphorus, gallium, germanium, platinum group elements
- Global refining concentration (2024): graphite ~93%, rare earths ~85%, cobalt ~79%, lithium ~70%, nickel ~44% held by one dominant processing country
- Projected India mineral demand 2025–2070: copper >66 MT, graphite ~46 MT, silicon ~19.5 MT, phosphorus ~16.7 MT, nickel ~11.5 MT
- National Critical Mineral Mission outlay: ₹34,300 crore over FY2024-25 to FY2030-31 (approved January 2025)
- India's non-fossil-fuel capacity target: 500 GW by 2030; net-zero target: 2070