Rethinking Materials Security

The event will gather a multi-disciplinary roundtable of experts to foster the exchange of perspectives on the present and future agenda for critical and strategic materials security, and its interplay with climate, water, energy, and human security.

This event is invitation-only, and the seats are already filled. If you are not attending but interested in receiving more information about the session afterward, please contact Kevin Rossi.

The roundtable discussions will revolve around two paradigms:

Winning processes

The overhaul of critical and strategic raw materials winning processes impacts traditional (mining, extraction, ...) as well as emergent approaches (mining from waste, deep-sea mining, urban mining). Many unknowns still parallel these innovations. Yet, we cannot delay policy because of unknowns.
Guiding question: How to deal with uncertainties?
How should policy weight the benefits, risks, and unknowns related to raw material extraction technologies?

Materials & Product Redesign

A main challenge ahead lies in the redesign of products and materials, such that we reduce or replace a critical resource, design them in a circular fashion, and enabling a target functionality. In this context, artificial intelligence methods, computational modelling, modern experimental set-ups, and tailored investment schemes, promise to overcome long-standing challenges and limitations, and drastically accelerate the redesign of novel materials and products.
Guiding question: Policy and innovation hand in hand.
How can the process of technological innovation and policymaking reinforce each other in overcoming the challenges of redesigning materials and products?

Our discussion would have an interdisciplinary character and will include engineering, economic, environmental, societal, and ethical challenges. Through a uniquely multidisciplinary blend of expertise and perspectives, the meeting aims at fostering the co-creation of a holistic overview on how capacity building, research coordination, public-private investment, and public policy lie at the cornerstones of a sustainable and resilient materials ecosystem. 

The roundtable Rethinking Material Security is organized by Dr. Kevin Rossi and prof. Behnam Taebi of the Climate Safety & Security Center @ TU Delft | The Hague. For questions please contact: k.r.rossi@tudelft.nl.