Almost a year after the adoption of the Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA), civil society organisations raise their concerns about the socio-environmental risks of fast-tracking mining projects that do not have support from the local population and show signs of flawed permitting or inadequate Environmental Impact Assessments.
To illustrate these risks, Friends of the Earth Europe has analysed several case studies across Europe and beyond, together with grassroots organisations as well as the European Environmental Bureau (EEB), Amigas de la Tierra and MiningWatch Portugal. These case studies of contested mining projects have resulted in 6 factsheets on key sacrifice zones: Covas do Barroso (Portugal), Alberta (Spain), Rovina (Romania), Kringlerne (Greenland), Salar de Atacama (Chile) and Zinnwald (Germany) and Caceres (Spain). This is only a small selection of contested mining projects across the world.
In all of these sacrifice zones, mining projects are opposed by the local population and civil society organisations, because of a lack of meaningful participation and the threat mines pose to valuable ecosystems due to (often irreversible) degradation of water, soil quality and biodiversity.
As explained in our position paper, we call on the European Commission to take the information provided in the factsheets into account when selecting the Strategic Projects, rather than blindly following corporate interests. Destructive mining projects in vulnerable nature areas should not be allowed to happen, especially not when the companies behind them have a track record of non-compliance with EU regulations or international standards. The EU’s rush for minerals should not lead to an extractivist agenda that disregards the realities of local communities and sacrifices the environment for corporate profits/industrial competitiveness. Instead, the Commission must focus on reduction of the demand for CRMs (e.g. through circular economy strategies) and prioritise people’s well-being and protection of the environment.
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