A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE: CAN THE URGENT NEED FOR CRITICAL MINERALS OVERCOME GEOLOGY'S FUNDAMENTAL TENSION BETWEEN INDUSTRY AND ENVIRONMENT?

Critical minerals are those natural resources that have been deemed critical to our national and economic security and those minerals which we rely on imports--often from countries with whom we may have occasionally frosty relations--for a large percentage of our consumption. Overwhelming bipartisan support at the Federal level as well as support from both legislative and executive branches has resulted in new, well-funded programs to support basic and applied research into the natural distribution of critical minerals in the Earth’s crust as well as the techno-economics of their production. One of the most controversial aspects of the federal critical minerals policy is that it has at its centerpiece the onshoring of critical mineral production—that is, new mines in America. And indeed, we have seen the Mountain Pass mine in California reopen and a new critical mineral mine in southeast Nebraska pursue production from the Elk Creek Carbonatite. This renewed interest in mining poses a challenge to the 21^st century geology workforce: how can we support a significant and rapid expansion in mining in an environmentally responsible way? This question is perhaps one of the fundamental tensions in geology how do we reconcile extraction of resources (industry) with the effects of that extraction (environment)? Interestingly, there are often geologists on both sides of this tension. The long arc of the last 50 years has been to off-shore resource extraction to places with looser regulations. However, federal policy has set an on-shoring imperative and modern ideas about environmental justice have questioned the moral standing of exporting our negative externalities. One of the great challenges for the next 30 years of geology will be to work through this issue. By bringing together the science, the stakeholders, the solutions, and the students we can build an enduring workflow for responsible resource extraction.