Canada is set to enhance its energy security by significantly reducing the development timeline for new critical mineral mines, aiming to cut the process by nearly ten years.
“There are ways you can just do things smarter … There’s no reason that you can’t do permitting of different things between federal and provincial governments at the same time, instead of doing them sequentially,” Energy Minister Jonathan Wilkinson told Reuters on Tuesday, adding that the optimization aims to cut down a process that normally takes 12 to 15 years “down to maybe five.”
The focus is on six essential minerals crucial for electric vehicles and wind turbines production: lithium, graphite, nickel, cobalt, copper, and rare earth elements.
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While he acknowledged that China is too dominant in the mining and processing of these critical minerals, Wilkinson said that Canada will still need to import cobalt due to scarce domestic resources. China currently has control over the majority of the world’s refined cobalt and rare earth supplies.
To facilitate these developments, Canada plans to introduce investment tax credits covering a significant portion of the capital costs for new mining and mineral processing projects. Additionally, financial support will be available for infrastructure projects, such as transmission lines and roads, to expedite new mineral developments.
The government is also investing in battery factory projects within Canada, partnering with companies like Northvolt and Volkswagen, and establishing a loan guarantee program to aid indigenous communities in participating as equity investors in existing and future projects.
Despite protests from First Nation communities against mining in the “Ring of Fire” area, Wilkinson assured that the streamlined permitting and environmental assessments would not compromise standards, emphasizing the critical role of these minerals in the energy transition.
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