A study by the Institute for Energy and Transport of the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission has concluded that five metals – including the rare earths dysprosium and neodymium – are at high risk of bottlenecking the EU’s deployment of low-carbon energy technologies through its Strategic Energy Technology Plan (SET-Plan).
The study, Critical Metals in Strategic Energy Technologies, examined the use of metals in the SET-Plan’s six low-carbon energy technologies – nuclear, solar, wind, bioenergy, carbon capture and storage (CCS), and the electricity grid.
From the 60 elements included in the study, its authors found that the five most high risk metals were particularly relevant to the manufacture of wind and photovoltaic (PV) energy generation technologies.
Calculating risk
The study calculated the average annual demand for each element from...