World Circular Economy Forum 2024 – Material demand and solutions for the energy transition

This event, co-organised by the International Resource Panel (IRP) and International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM), started with a presentation of the IRP’s new flagship report, the Global Resources Outlook 2024 (GRO24). This report shows that extraction and processing of material resources – namely, biomass, fossil fuels, metals and minerals – is the main driver for the triple planetary crises of climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution.

With the energy transition, demand for transition materials will increase significantly. This growing demand poses challenges arising from potential supply- demand imbalances for certain materials and it will be compounded by adverse environmental impacts along the entire value chain. The need to achieve the energy transition, whilst at the same time decoupling ever- increasing material use from economic growth, human wellbeing, and environmental impacts, will require concrete government interventions for optimising provisioning systems to mitigate growth in material and energy demand; adopting circular economy strategies to reduce transition material demand and maximise future secondary supply; ensuring the transition material extraction with highest environmental and social standards (given primary extraction will still be necessary to achieve the requisite energy transition).

Colette van der Ven spoke at this plenary event, and highlighted key findings from TULIP’s report for OVAM on how to address resource consumption with the EU.

The panel recording can be accessed here.