On Monday, February 2nd, U.S. President Trump announced the launch of a crucial mineral reserve program in the Oval Office of the White House. The U.S. Secretary of the Interior indicated that more countries are joining this reserve program.
Trump stated, “For years, American businesses have been facing the risk of shortages in crucial mineral resources during market turmoil. Today, we’ve initiated a program called ‘Project Vault’ to ensure that American businesses and workers will never suffer from any shortages.”
“Over the past year, my administration has taken extraordinary measures to ensure that the United States has all the crucial minerals and rare earths we need… Today, we will build on these accomplishments to establish this critically important new reserve.”
The President mentioned that the project will bring together $10 billion in financing from the Export-Import Bank of the United States and $2 billion from the private sector.
John Jovanovic, the President of the Export-Import Bank, also joined Trump in announcing the “Project Vault” on Monday. He mentioned that the best part of this project is that American taxpayers will see a return from funding the nation’s first strategic mineral reserve.
U.S. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum stated that an additional 11 countries will be announced to join this reserve program later this week.
This will be the first such reserve project in the U.S. private sector. The United States currently has a national strategic mineral reserve to meet the needs of the defense industry, but a civilian reserve has not yet been established.
Mary Teresa Barra, CEO of General Motors, expressed during the event, “Having a resilient supply chain is crucial for our country, for all industries, especially the automotive sector. The policies implemented in the past year have strengthened our supply chain.”
Previously, several U.S. government officials revealed details of the “Project Vault” to Bloomberg. This project is similar to the existing U.S. national strategic oil reserve, but the reserves will no longer focus on crude oil, instead, they will target minerals like gallium and cobalt, materials widely used in products such as iPhones, batteries, and jet engines. It is expected that the reserve will cover rare earths and critical minerals, as well as other elements with strategic importance and significant price fluctuations.
This move comes as the U.S. seeks to reduce its reliance on China for critical minerals such as rare earths. The CCP controls 70% of global rare earth mining and 90% of rare earth processing. Last year, Beijing tightened export controls on some minerals, forcing some American manufacturers to cut production. This action by the CCP has heightened the sense of urgency for the Trump administration to take measures to mitigate risks in the critical mineral supply chain.