Politico: “The Energy Department this week unveiled its final list of “critical materials,” a determination that could shape how the agency spends billions of dollars to thwart climate change and bolster a shift to electric vehicles and renewable energy like offshore wind and solar. The assessment deems more than a dozen materials critical, including the addition of natural graphite needed in EVs and copper for transmission lines, as well as engineered materials like silicon carbide and electrical steel used in electronics and EV inverters. The list also includes minerals like lithium, cobalt and nickel, which are used in EVs, as well as rare earth metals. DOE’s final list reflects highly sought-after materials that not only face supply chain risks, but also have no easy substitutes. It’s a distinction that allows DOE to prioritize a supercharged flow of money allocated by laws like the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law and last year’s Inflation Reduction Act toward establishing domestic supply chains for key materials currently dominated by countries like China..”