Why Brussels has left Castilla y León out of its rare earth extraction plan

The new international social, economic and geopolitical context has forced the European Union to take steps towards self-sufficiency, reducing dependence on the outside world as much as possible. In response to this, the Critical Raw Materials Act (European Raw Materials Pact) was born.

A project to ensure a secure, sustainable and resilient supply of the most in-demand materials, critical for their availability and essential for sectors such as the energy transition, electric mobility, digitalisation and the defence industry.

In total, 47 projects have been selected as strategic by the European Commission (EC) in a first call, seven of them in Spain, and Castilla y León has been left out for the time being, despite having a potential leadership in the extraction of some of these raw materials.

In any case, the general director of the National Cluster of Raw Materials (ISMC) and the International Centre for Advanced Materials and Raw Materials of Castilla y León, Santiago Cuesta López, qualifies that in the region there are "some promising projects that have the necessary elements to be declared of strategic interest and could be presented with greater success in future calls".

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