By Peter Willis
The interest in the 14 EU “critical raw materials” following the publication of a European Commission report released in June 2010 has led to a multitude of initiatives regarding their extraction, processing, trade and substitutability.
Considerable attention has been placed on the potential to reduce European reliance on imports of these materials through greater recycling and measures to reduce waste.
The results of a study on the recycling of each of the critical raw materials have now been published in a report entitled ‘A study into the feasibility of protecting and recovering critical raw materials through infrastructure development in the south east of England’.
By assessing in detail each of the major applications in which the materials are used, the study identified the end-products from which the greatest recycling opportunities exist within Europe.
“We found that a good proportion...