A Critical Metals Analysis for South Africa

Modern technology makes use of nearly the entire periodic table of the elements. No country has domestic deposits of all these elements, though some are far richer in this regard than others. In recent years, South African mines have supplied much of the world’s platinum, chromium, palladium, vanadium, zirconium, and manganese. As demand has risen worldwide for these metals and others, however, concerns have been expressed about the long-term availability of these resources. Using methodology recently developed at Yale University, the creation of a national metals criticality assessment for South Africa is proposed. The results of this project seem likely to provide useful information to several South African government agencies, including those of Industry and Mining.