Defence Spending to accelerate innovation in the mining sector

The mining industry is the foundation of the modern industrial economy, but it is not the first candidate most people would look to help the defence sector. Its importance lies in its necessary contribution to delivering materials needed to support defence infrastructure, as distinct from military hardware. The vast majority of defence spending provides the people, equipment and systems needed to support frontline activities – and the same is true for the mining sector.   

Over the last decade or so, the mining industry’s pace of change has not met the public’s expectations for reducing its environmental impact and it is now on track to fail to provide the industrial supply needed to ensure the success of the energy transition to a low-carbon economy. For this transition to succeed, the demand projections are for at least a two- or three-fold increase in metal production in the next decade or two and continuing to expand beyond 2050. The mining industry in its current form, nationally and globally, is simply incapable of achieving these targets. It is very difficult to make these kinds of changes in existing mines, so the success of the energy transition depends heavily on a significant increase in the rate of orebody discovery, mine development and building processing facilities. This cannot be achieved without reducing both the time and cost of bringing these operations on stream. 

The Centre for Excellence in Mining Innovation (CEMI) hosts the Mining Innovation Commercialization Accelerator (MICA) Network that is creating the mining innovation ecosystem across Canada. This supports Small to Medium Enterprise (SME) innovators to deliver new innovations to the mining industry nationally and globally. With $32M from the Federal Government, MICA now funds 70 pan-Canadian projects that have attracted almost $270M in private sector investments – but this is only 20% of all the high-TRL, near-commercial projects we could have supported. These projects focus on increasing production at lower cost, reducing energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, expanding the use of automated and autonomous vehicles, reducing environmental impact and liabilities, focus on accessing critical mineral resources and increasing post-mining circular economic activity. 

Globally, the Canadian mining sector is one of the most innovative in the industry, but mines in Canada are some of the slowest adopters of innovation. This means that Canadian innovators have become successful by exporting their solutions and CEMI’s MICA program is connecting to the R&D ecosystems in the major mining jurisdictions to help speed up commercial access to these highly adoptive markets.  

The energy transition requires a disruptive rate of change in the supply capacity of metals and minerals and this in turn requires a disruptive change in the extraction, processing and manufacturing of the products essential for modern batteries and magnets, to name but two. Despite the significant innovation capacity in Canada, the low adoption rate of our internal market constrains growth of our innovators causing them to relocate or to sell their IP to foreign investors. This is often experienced at the final stage of innovation which is executing field trials that demonstrate how the new technique or technology is effective in an operating setting. The cost of these trials are seldom borne by risk-averse mining companies in Canada and this leaves innovators vulnerable to the siren song of foreign investors and our global industry competitors. With few options to build their company’s future in Canada, innovators find they can only build it elsewhere. We export not only our IP but effectively gift the entire national investment chain from college and university R&D though to successful pilot trials, to foreign businesses all for lack of support at the final stage. This happens in every sector of our economy, but its effect is particularly egregious in the mining sector. Natural resources are immovable and since we no longer allow foreign investors to acquire these resources, if they are not exploited by Canada, they will not be exploited at all. 

Defence infrastructure systems require the same access to critical minerals and strategic metals as the automotive and telecommunications sectors. The changing nature of Canada’s global relationships now means we have to accelerate the development of secure national supply chains for these resources nationally, and support of our allies that have fewer natural resources and less capacity to exploit these resources that Canada does. Using investment in defence infrastructure can free mining innovators from the constraints imposed by the mining sector. 

This will have significant economic and social benefits. It will allow innovators access to field trial opportunities to demonstrate their creativity and business acumen and give them easier access to market adopters in Canada and abroad. It also helps retain IP in Canada where it increases the number of people employed in the service and supply segment of the mining sector. This segment already hosts more than 50% of the jobs in the mining sector; which is a percentage that must increase rapidly as increasing automation makes our mines more globally competitive. The transition to autonomous and selective production systems will rejuvenate existing bulk mining operations and allow them to compete globally. It also will allow Canadian innovators to dramatically change the way the global industry manages its solid byproducts and liquid effluent, eliminating the need for long-term ‘waste’ storage and spinning off new businesses based on alternative application of these secondary minerals. These new technologies will be especially beneficial in remote and indigenous communities, transforming the industry to become a more inclusive and diverse workforce This is a unique opportunity we cannot afford to squander.