Critical Raw Materials — France’s Mining Renaissance and Supply Chain Sovereignty

France’s reindustrialization ambitions confront an uncomfortable geological reality: the country is overwhelmingly dependent on foreign sources — predominantly Chinese — for the critical raw materials essential to energy transition technologies, defense systems, and advanced electronics. Lithium, cobalt, nickel, rare earth elements, gallium, germanium, and graphite are the material foundations upon which electric vehicles, wind turbines, semiconductor chips, and military equipment are built. Without secure, diversified access to these materials, France’s entire France 2030 industrial strategy risks being undermined at its most fundamental input level. The €2.1 billion allocation for critical raw materials within France 2030, combined with the EU Critical Raw Materials Act, represents France’s first serious attempt in decades to rebuild domestic mining, processing, and recycling capabilities for strategic minerals.

The Dependency Problem

The scale of France’s critical raw materials dependency is staggering. China controls approximately 60% of global rare earth mining, 90% of rare earth processing, 65% of lithium refining, 70% of cobalt refining, and 80% of gallium and germanium production. For many of these materials, there are no readily available substitutes in current technologies: neodymium and dysprosium are essential for permanent magnets in wind turbines and EV motors; lithium is irreplaceable in current battery chemistries; gallium is critical for 5G telecommunications and military radar systems.

This concentration of supply in a single geopolitical actor creates vulnerabilities that go beyond conventional supply chain risk. China’s July 2023 imposition of export controls on gallium and germanium — explicitly framed as retaliation for Western semiconductor export restrictions — demonstrated that critical raw materials can be weaponized as instruments of geopolitical leverage. For France, which depends on Chinese-processed gallium for STMicroelectronics’ chip production and on Chinese rare earth magnets for Safran’s aircraft engine actuators and Naval Group’s submarine motors, this weaponization represents a direct national security threat.

The European Commission’s 2023 study on supply chain vulnerabilities identified 34 critical raw materials for which the EU faces significant supply risk. For 19 of these, China is the primary or dominant global supplier. France’s own assessments, conducted by the BRGM (Bureau de Recherches Géologiques et Minières) and the COMES (Comité pour les Métaux Stratégiques), confirm that the country lacks domestic production of any critical raw material in quantities sufficient to meet industrial demand.

The Imerys Lithium Project — Flagship Domestic Extraction

The centerpiece of France’s domestic mining renaissance is the Imerys Emili lithium project in the Allier department of central France. Imerys, a French specialty minerals company, controls a lithium-bearing granite deposit at Échassières that is one of the largest identified lithium resources in Europe, with estimated reserves of approximately 300,000 tonnes of lithium metal equivalent — sufficient to supply a significant portion of European battery manufacturing demand for decades.

The project targets extraction of 34,000 tonnes of lithium hydroxide annually by 2028, sufficient to manufacture batteries for approximately 700,000 electric vehicles per year. The total investment is estimated at €1 billion, with approximately €200 million in France 2030 subsidies. The extraction process uses a combination of underground mining (accessing the lithium-rich mica mineral lepidolite at depths of 75-350 meters) and hydrometallurgical processing to produce battery-grade lithium hydroxide.

The Imerys project has attracted significant local opposition, with environmental groups and some local residents objecting to the visual impact of mining infrastructure, potential groundwater contamination, and the industrialization of a rural landscape. The environmental impact assessment, submitted in 2023, has undergone extensive public consultation, and the prefectoral authorization process has been slower than Imerys initially anticipated. The tension between national sovereignty objectives (reducing dependence on imported lithium) and local environmental concerns (preserving the Allier countryside) encapsulates one of the fundamental governance challenges of the energy transition.

If successfully developed, the Imerys project would make France the only major EU member state with significant domestic lithium production capacity. Combined with Portugal’s lithium deposits (in Boticas and Covas do Barroso, also facing permitting challenges) and Germany’s planned geothermal lithium extraction projects, it could contribute to a European lithium supply chain that reduces the continent’s dependence on Australian, Chilean, and Chinese sources.

Rare Earth Recycling and Processing

France’s rare earth strategy focuses on recycling and secondary production rather than primary mining, reflecting the absence of economically viable rare earth deposits on French territory. Solvay (the Belgian-French specialty chemicals group) operates one of Europe’s only rare earth separation facilities at La Rochelle, which processes mixed rare earth concentrates into separated oxides used in magnets, catalysts, and polishing compounds. The La Rochelle facility has the capacity to process approximately 5,000 tonnes of rare earth oxides annually — a fraction of global demand but a strategically important European capability.

France 2030 invests approximately €300 million in expanding and upgrading the La Rochelle facility, developing new solvent extraction processes that improve separation efficiency and reduce chemical waste, and establishing rare earth recycling capabilities. The recycling dimension targets end-of-life permanent magnets from wind turbines, EVs, and electronic devices, which contain significant quantities of neodymium, praseodymium, and dysprosium. Carester, a French startup spun off from CNRS research, is developing novel extraction processes for recovering rare earths from electronic waste with higher efficiency and lower environmental impact than conventional methods.

The EU Critical Raw Materials Act (adopted in 2024) sets targets for European raw materials self-sufficiency: by 2030, at least 10% of EU consumption should be met by domestic extraction, 40% by domestic processing, and 25% by recycling. For rare earths specifically, the recycling target is particularly relevant, as Europe generates approximately 12,000 tonnes of permanent magnet waste annually — much of which is currently exported to China for processing and is lost to the European value chain.

Battery Mineral Processing

The development of battery mineral processing capacity in France represents a critical complement to the EV battery gigafactory program. Producing battery cells requires not just raw minerals but processed materials in specific chemical forms: lithium hydroxide or lithium carbonate, nickel sulfate, cobalt sulfate, and high-purity graphite. These processing steps are currently dominated by China, which controls 65-90% of global capacity depending on the specific material.

France 2030 supports the development of domestic processing capabilities through several flagship projects. Orano (the French nuclear fuel cycle company) is investing €1 billion in a lithium conversion plant in Dunkirk, designed to process imported lithium spodumene concentrate into battery-grade lithium hydroxide. The Dunkirk location — adjacent to the port and co-located with the emerging battery valley — enables direct supply to ACC, Verkor, and AESC gigafactories.

Eramet, the French mining and metallurgy group, is developing nickel and cobalt refining capabilities at its Le Havre facility, using proprietary hydrometallurgical processes to produce battery-grade nickel sulfate from imported nickel laterite ores (sourced from Eramet’s Weda Bay mine in Indonesia and potentially from New Caledonian sources). The total investment is approximately €500 million, with France 2030 contributing €150 million.

For graphite — the anode material in lithium-ion batteries, of which China controls over 90% of global processed supply — France’s options are more limited. No significant graphite deposits exist on French territory, and synthetic graphite production (from petroleum coke) is energy-intensive and expensive. France 2030 supports research into silicon-based anode alternatives (which could reduce or eliminate graphite dependence) and investments in graphite recycling from end-of-life batteries.

The BRGM and Geological Survey Renaissance

The Bureau de Recherches Géologiques et Minières (BRGM), France’s national geological survey, has received enhanced funding under France 2030 to conduct comprehensive resource assessments of French metropolitan and overseas territories. The €150 million allocation supports airborne geophysical surveys, drilling programs, and geological mapping at scales sufficient to identify previously unknown mineral deposits.

France’s overseas territories represent a potentially significant but underexplored resource base. New Caledonia hosts one of the world’s largest nickel deposits (operated by Eramet’s SLN subsidiary, Prony Resources, and Glencore’s Koniambo Nickel), producing approximately 200,000 tonnes of nickel ore annually. French Guiana may contain gold, rare earth, and other mineral deposits in its Amazonian interior, though exploitation faces formidable environmental and indigenous rights constraints. The deep seabeds within France’s 11.7 million km² Exclusive Economic Zone — the world’s second largest — contain polymetallic nodules, cobalt crusts, and hydrothermal vent deposits of potential but unproven economic interest.

The BRGM’s survey work extends beyond French territory through international partnerships. France participates in the EU’s ERMA (European Raw Materials Alliance), contributes geological expertise to African nations through bilateral cooperation agreements, and supports the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) in mineral-producing countries. These international engagements serve both development objectives and France’s interest in diversifying its raw material supply chains away from Chinese dominance.

EU Critical Raw Materials Act

The EU Critical Raw Materials Act, adopted in March 2024, provides the regulatory framework within which France’s national strategy operates. The Act establishes several mechanisms directly relevant to French interests. The designation of “Strategic Projects” eligible for streamlined permitting and priority access to EU funding — the Imerys lithium project is expected to receive this designation. The creation of a European Critical Raw Materials Board for supply chain monitoring and crisis coordination. Mandatory recycled content requirements for certain products (complementing the EU Battery Regulation). Strategic stockpiling provisions allowing member states to build emergency reserves of critical materials.

France played a leading role in shaping the Act’s final text, advocating for ambitious domestic extraction and processing targets and for the inclusion of nuclear fuel materials (uranium, enriched uranium) within the critical raw materials framework — a position that reflected France’s unique dependence on nuclear energy and Orano’s commercial interests in the nuclear fuel cycle.

Defense Dimensions

The defense sector’s critical raw materials requirements, while smaller in volume than civilian industrial demand, carry particular urgency given national security implications. Military systems depend on specialized materials including rare earth permanent magnets (for guided missile fins, submarine motors, and satellite reaction wheels), tungsten (for armor-piercing ammunition), titanium (for aircraft structures), and beryllium (for satellite optics and nuclear weapons components).

The DGA (Direction Générale de l’Armement) maintains a classified assessment of defense-specific supply chain vulnerabilities and has established a dedicated “Matériaux Stratégiques de Défense” program that funds stockpiling, substitution research, and qualified alternative supplier development for the most critical defense materials. The program’s details are largely classified, but publicly available information indicates investments in domestic tungsten recycling, the qualification of non-Chinese rare earth magnet suppliers for missile guidance systems, and research into rare-earth-free motor technologies for submarine propulsion.

Urban Mining and Circular Economy

The concept of “urban mining” — recovering critical raw materials from end-of-life products and industrial waste streams — represents a strategically important complement to primary extraction. France generates substantial volumes of electronic waste (approximately 1.5 million tonnes annually), end-of-life vehicles (approximately 1.6 million vehicles annually), and industrial metallic waste that contain recoverable quantities of critical materials.

The EU Battery Regulation (adopted in 2023) mandates minimum recycled content levels for new batteries: 16% recycled cobalt, 6% recycled lithium, and 6% recycled nickel by 2031, increasing to 26% cobalt, 12% lithium, and 15% nickel by 2036. These requirements create a guaranteed market for battery recycling output and have catalyzed investment in French recycling infrastructure.

SNAM (Société Nouvelle d’Affinage des Métaux), based in Viviez (Aveyron), operates one of Europe’s largest battery recycling facilities, processing approximately 10,000 tonnes of end-of-life lithium-ion batteries annually. The company’s hydrometallurgical process recovers cobalt, nickel, lithium, and manganese at purities sufficient for direct reuse in battery manufacturing. France 2030 supports SNAM’s capacity expansion to 50,000 tonnes annually by 2028, with approximately €80 million in public funding.

Orano, leveraging its expertise in nuclear materials processing, has entered the battery recycling market through its subsidiary Orano Projets. The company is constructing a €50 million battery recycling pilot plant at La Hague (Normandy), adapting solvent extraction technologies originally developed for nuclear fuel reprocessing to the recovery of battery materials. The La Hague facility targets processing capacity of 5,000 tonnes annually, with plans for industrial-scale expansion.

Veolia, the French environmental services group, operates a rare earth recycling facility in Saint-Fons (Lyon) — one of only a handful in Europe — processing fluorescent lamp phosphors to recover yttrium, europium, and terbium. While the volumes are small (approximately 200 tonnes of rare earth oxides annually), the facility demonstrates the technical viability of rare earth recycling and provides a template for scaling to larger waste streams as wind turbine magnets and EV motors reach end-of-life in the 2030s.

The circular economy approach is particularly relevant for materials where France has no geological resources. Germanium, indium, tantalum, and platinum group metals are all present in electronic and industrial waste streams at concentrations that, while low, can be economically recovered through specialized metallurgical processes. The ADEME (Agence de la Transition Écologique) estimates that France’s urban mining potential could supply 15-25% of domestic critical raw material demand by 2035 — a meaningful contribution to supply chain resilience, though insufficient to eliminate import dependence.

International Partnerships and Resource Diplomacy

France’s critical raw materials strategy extends beyond domestic borders through a network of bilateral partnerships, EU-level agreements, and multilateral initiatives designed to diversify supply sources away from Chinese dominance.

The Franco-Australian Critical Minerals Partnership, signed in December 2022, provides a framework for French investment in Australian lithium, nickel, cobalt, and rare earth mining projects, along with research cooperation on mineral processing technologies. Australia — which hosts significant deposits of most critical materials but lacks processing capacity — is a natural complement to France’s strategy of developing processing capabilities.

In Africa, France maintains mineral resource cooperation agreements with Morocco (phosphates and cobalt), the Democratic Republic of Congo (cobalt and tantalum), Gabon (manganese), and Senegal (zircon and titanium). These agreements typically combine geological survey cooperation (funded through BRGM technical assistance), infrastructure investment (roads and ports to improve mine-to-market logistics), and governance support (strengthening mining codes and transparency frameworks). The relationships are complicated by the legacy of French colonial engagement in Africa and the growing competition from Chinese mining companies that offer infrastructure financing on terms that French and European institutions struggle to match.

The EU’s strategic partnerships with Chile (lithium), Canada (critical minerals), and Namibia (green hydrogen and critical materials) provide additional diversification pathways. France actively promotes these EU-level agreements through its role in the Trade Council and the European External Action Service, advocating for trade agreements that include dedicated critical raw materials chapters with provisions for supply security, environmental standards, and technology transfer.

Kazakhstan, which possesses significant deposits of uranium, chromium, titanium, and rare earths, represents a particularly important partner for France. Orano’s uranium mining operations in Kazakhstan (through the KATCO joint venture) provide approximately 25% of France’s uranium supply, and the bilateral relationship has been expanded to include cooperation on rare earth extraction from uranium mining waste streams — a potentially significant secondary source of critical materials.

Assessment and Outlook

France’s critical raw materials strategy is arguably the most challenging dimension of the broader reindustrialization agenda. Unlike semiconductors, batteries, or pharmaceuticals — where the primary constraint is capital investment and workforce development — raw materials sovereignty confronts geological realities that cannot be engineered away. France simply does not possess the geological endowment to achieve self-sufficiency in most critical minerals, and no amount of investment can change the concentration of certain deposits in geopolitically inconvenient locations.

The strategy’s realistic objective is therefore not autarky but resilience: diversifying supply sources (reducing dependence on any single country below 50%), developing processing capabilities that provide control over intermediate value chain stages, maximizing recycling to create a circular supply of critical materials, and investing in substitution research that could eliminate or reduce dependence on the most supply-constrained materials.

The €2.1 billion France 2030 allocation, combined with EU Critical Raw Materials Act implementation and private sector investment exceeding €3 billion, provides a credible foundation for this resilience strategy. The Imerys lithium project, Orano’s lithium conversion plant, Solvay’s rare earth facility upgrade, and Eramet’s battery mineral processing investments collectively address the most acute vulnerabilities. Whether they can be delivered on timeline, at projected costs, and with social acceptance — particularly for politically contentious mining projects — remains the central execution question for France’s raw materials renaissance.