Critical minerals are the strategic resource in today’s version of the Cold War. These raw materials, which require sophisticated and complex techniques to extract and process, will largely dictate U.S. success or failure in that geopolitical contest. Their applications span the aerospace, defense, electronics, energy, medical, and transportation sectors.
Fortunately, after years of lagging in the critical minerals domain, the United States is working hard to turn things around.
This July, the Department of Energy announced that $75 million, as part of a $1 billion commitment announced in August 2025, would be used to accelerate critical minerals and materials recovery from coal and coal-based sources. Five projects will develop pilot-scale facilities to produce market-ready critical minerals. This is just a small piece of the “whole-of-government” approach issued in accordance with President Donald Trump’s executive order, “Unleashing American Energy.”
The term “whole-of-government approach” is a staple of D.C. policy lingo, particularly when it comes to critical minerals — but that term has often been more cliche and aspiration than reality. However, in recent weeks, that concept has shown signs of finally coming to fruition — and underscores the need for further ambitious efforts down the road.
A dual-path effort announced this summer by both the Pentagon and the DOE has injected new life into efforts to rehabilitate the rare earth elements supply chain in the U.S.
First, the DOE’s recently announced $134 million project aims to create a proof of concept for future larger-scale efforts. The department announced that it will fund two experimental facilities for a REE extraction and reprocessing pilot program.
Second, the Pentagon, with $1.2 billion in loans, is helping support two new commercial facilities involved in REE reprocessing, including one being constructed by the same recipient of the DOE funding.
This strategic, unified government approach is in stark contrast to the piecemeal, disparate critical minerals efforts undertaken by various agencies in prior years. This public-private cooperation is also far likelier to pay dividends. Like defense manufacturers, companies in the fledgling critical minerals industry require clear demand signals from the federal government. After all, U.S. critical minerals firms are, by nature, taking risks by wading into a sector that has gravitated to China, and away from the United States. When the demand signal is there, the industry has more reason to take risks, particularly if federal funding lowers research and development costs, as the DOE effort aims to do.
There is no doubt that China still has a stronghold on critical minerals. However, while Beijing has a yearslong head start, the U.S. private sector has unparalleled innovative potential. With more executive branch initiatives to support industry, and Congress passing legislation that advances market development of critical minerals, the U.S. may yet become a major player in the global critical minerals industry.
A concerted American strategy, including the federal government marshaling industry and top researchers to beat our adversary, worked in the Cold War and can work again. Just one example is illustrative:
President Ronald Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative sought to secure U.S. advantages over a sophisticated adversary by fielding new missile defense technology to erode Moscow’s deterrence and force unsustainable increases in Soviet defense spending. SDI engaged America’s best physicists — including those outside the government. The Reagan administration sought feedback, including criticism, from top physicists in academia to find the best technical solutions for missile and space technologies. The same is needed in today’s arms race: critical minerals.
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Fortunately, unlike SDI, critical mineral reshoring is a bipartisan issue. Americans of all political persuasions view China’s near-monopoly over this invaluable resource, including Chinese control of over 90% of rare-earth processing capacity, as dangerous. Summarizing its polling on this, Data for Progress said in 2024, “a majority of voters across party lines believe expanding domestic critical mineral production is important, with few voters saying they would oppose a new mine in the U.S. under any circumstances.”
China’s recent efforts to sabotage U.S. critical minerals development show that Americans are right to be concerned. As the physical building blocks of American prosperity and security, critical minerals are too important to leave vulnerable to foreign control. When the federal government makes strides to build critical mineral facilities, America becomes more energy-secure.
Sydney Rodman is a writing fellow with ConservAmerica.