42 U.S.C. § 19067 — Critical minerals mining research and development
submitted 4 years ago by Pub. L. 117-167 to r/title-42-THE-PUBLIC-HEALTH-AND-WELFARE · 989 words · no verdicts yet
The Director must fund basic research to make U.S. critical mineral mining safer, cheaper, and less reliant on foreign supply. This includes studying artificial intelligence, recycling, and training new mining engineers. A federal subcommittee also coordinates government-wide policy on critical materials supply chains.
(a) Critical minerals mining research and development at the Foundation. (1) In general: To help supply chains hold up under pressure, the Director* must make competitive awards to colleges or nonprofits, including groups of them, to fund basic research that speeds up innovation in critical minerals mining strategies and technologies. The goal is to make better use of domestic mineral resources and stop the country from depending on minerals whose supply could be disrupted. (2) Use of funds: Money from these awards can go toward: developing new mapping and mining technologies and techniques, including better ways to extract, produce, separate, alloy, or process critical minerals that use less energy, improve or create new supply chains, and make mining more efficient, affordable, and less harmful to the environment; improving how critical minerals are separated, alloyed, manufactured, or recycled in ways that cut energy use, waste, environmental harm, and cost; long-term observation of reclaimed mine sites from the ground and air, including studying how microbial diversity changes there over time; studying how artificial intelligence could help find critical minerals underground, including what size and variety of data would be needed; studying how machine learning could help detect and sort critical minerals, and what data that would require; detailed isotope studies of critical minerals to build more accurate geologic models; improving understanding of the geological and chemical processes that form and concentrate critical minerals into deposits worth mining; and giving undergraduate and graduate students training and research opportunities to become the next generation of mining engineers and researchers. (3) Existing programs: The Director must make sure these awards add to, rather than repeat, existing programs across the Foundation and the rest of the federal government.
(b) Critical Materials Interagency Subcommittee. (1) In general: The Critical Minerals Subcommittee of the National Science and Technology Council — called "the Subcommittee" here — must coordinate federal science and technology work to keep critical materials supplied to the United States securely, reliably, and sustainably. (2) Purposes: The Subcommittee exists to advise the National Science and Technology Council, including its Committee on Homeland and National Security, on U.S. policy toward critical materials — covering federal research that limits the environmental harm of extracting and processing them, efficient use and reuse of them, the workforce that handles them, and private investment in related innovation and technology transfer; to spot new opportunities, encourage international cooperation, and help build secure and reliable supply chains, including modeling how supply problems could unfold; to keep information and data about critical materials transparent; and to recommend how federal research, development, and deployment programs can better coordinate to keep critical materials flowing for national security, the economy, public health, and industry. (3) Responsibilities: Taking into account advice from relevant advisory committees, the Subcommittee may: recommend how federal agencies can improve mapping of the United States and make that data easier to find and use, within legal, privacy, and security limits; assess progress on recycling and reprocessing critical materials and finding alternatives to them; set up a way to coordinate and evaluate federal programs that need critical materials, working alongside private industry and other domestic and international efforts; look at ways to get and develop critical materials by investing and trading with U.S. allies; recommend ways to encourage private industry to adopt new science and technology; assess and recommend how to address workforce challenges in the critical materials supply chain, including an aging workforce and competition from other countries for U.S. talent; build and update a strategic plan and roadmap for federal science and technology work across critical material supply chains, covering diversifying sources, using materials more efficiently, recycling, substitution, and related fields like data science, materials science, and manufacturing; assess the supply of trained workers needed for critical materials research, mining, and production, especially for energy critical materials; and report to the relevant congressional committees on the Subcommittee's activities and findings.
(c) Definitions. In this section, the terms "critical mineral" and "critical mineral or metal" also include any host mineral that a critical mineral comes from, using the meaning of those terms in section 1606 of title 30.
In order to support supply chain resiliency, the Director* shall make awards, on a competitive basis, to institutions of higher education or nonprofit organizations (or consortia of such institutions or organizations) to support basic research that will accelerate innovation to advance critical minerals mining strategies and technologies for the purpose of making better use of domestic resources and eliminating national reliance on minerals and mineral materials that are subject to supply disruptions.
Activities funded by an award under this section may include—
advancing mining research and development activities to develop new mapping and mining technologies and techniques, including advanced critical mineral extraction and production, separation, alloying, or processing techniques and technologies that can decrease energy intensity to improve existing or to develop new supply chains of critical minerals, and to yield more efficient, economical, and environmentally benign mining practices*;
advancing critical mineral processing research activities to improve separation, alloying, manufacturing, or recycling techniques and technologies that can decrease the energy intensity, waste, potential environmental impact, and costs of those activities;
conducting long-term earth observation of reclaimed mine sites, including the study of the evolution of microbial diversity at such sites;
examining the application of artificial intelligence for geological exploration of critical minerals, including what size and diversity of data sets would be required;
examining the application of machine learning for detection and sorting of critical minerals, including what size and diversity of data sets would be required;
conducting detailed isotope studies of critical minerals and the development of more refined geologic models;
improved understanding of the geological and geochemical processes through which critical minerals form and are concentrated into economically viable deposits; or
providing training and research opportunities to undergraduate and graduate students to prepare the next generation of mining engineers and researchers.
The Director shall ensure awards made under this subsection are complementary and not duplicative of existing programs across the Foundation and Federal Government.
The Critical Minerals Subcommittee of the National Science and Technology Council (referred to in this section as the “Subcommittee”), shall coordinate Federal science and technology efforts to ensure secure, reliable, and environmentally sustainable supplies of critical materials to the United States.
The purposes of the Subcommittee shall be—
to advise and assist the National Science and Technology Council, including the Committee on Homeland and National Security, on United States policies, procedures, and plans as it relates to critical materials, including—
Federal research, development, and commercial application efforts to minimize the environmental impacts of methods for extractions, concentration, separation and purification of conventional, secondary, and unconventional sources of critical materials;
efficient use, substitution, and reuse of critical materials;
the critical materials workforce of the United States; and
United States private industry investments in innovation and technology transfer from federally funded science and technology;
to identify emerging opportunities, stimulate international cooperation, and foster the development of secure and reliable supply chains of critical materials and establish scenario modeling systems for supply problems of critical materials and energy critical materials;
to ensure the transparency of information and data related to critical materials; and
to provide recommendations on coordination and collaboration among the research, development, and deployment programs and activities of Federal agencies to promote a secure and reliable supply of critical materials necessary to maintain national security, economic well-being, public health, and industrial production.
In carrying out this subsection, the Subcommittee may, taking into account the findings and recommendations of relevant advisory committees—
provide recommendations on how Federal agencies may improve the topographic, geologic, and geophysical mapping of the United States and improve the discoverability, accessibility, and usability of the resulting and existing data, to the extent permitted by law and subject to appropriate limitation for purposes of privacy and security;
assess the progress towards developing critical materials recycling and reprocessing technologies, and technological alternatives to critical materials;
establish a mechanism for the coordination and evaluation of Federal programs with critical material needs, including Federal programs involving research and development, in a manner that complements related efforts carried out by the private sector and other domestic and international agencies and organizations;
examine options for accessing and developing critical materials through investment and trade with our allies and partners and provide recommendations;
evaluate and provide recommendations to incentivize the development and use of advances in science and technology in the private industry;
assess the need for and make recommendations to address the challenges the United States critical materials supply chain workforce faces, including aging and retiring personnel and faculty, and foreign competition for United States talent;
develop, and update as necessary, a strategic plan to guide Federal programs and activities to enhance scientific and technical capabilities across critical material supply chains, including a roadmap that identifies key research and development needs and coordinates on-going activities for source diversification, more efficient use, recycling, and substitution for critical materials; as well as cross-cutting mining science, data science techniques, materials science, manufacturing science and engineering, computational modeling, and environmental health and safety research and development;
assess the need for, and make recommendations concerning, the availability and adequacy of the supply of technically trained personnel necessary for critical materials research, development, extraction, and industrial production, with a particular focus on the problem of attracting and maintaining high-quality professionals for maintaining an adequate supply of energy critical materials; and
report to the appropriate Congressional committees on activities and findings under this section.
In this section, the terms “critical mineral” and “critical mineral or metal” include any host mineral of a critical mineral (within the meaning of those terms in section 1606 of title 30).
Source credit: (Pub. L. 117–167, div. B, title III, § 10359, Aug. 9, 2022, 136 Stat. 1564.)
- 2022Enacted · Pub. L. 117-167 · 136 Stat. 1564
A history note hasn’t been published yet. The record shows enactment by Pub. L. 117-167 on 2022-08-09.
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