We can't mine our way out of the climate crisis. 29 September 2020.

...Over 230 civil society organisations, community platforms and academics are urging the European Commission to reassess its plans for sourcing the raw materials it claims Europe will need to realise energy, industrial and military transitions. The Commission's plans risk destroying climate-critical ecosystems and sowing social conflict in Europe and in the Global South, authors of a collective letter that has received global support have warned....

Guadalupe Rodriguez...said: "The European Commission’s plans are encouraging mining projects in both the Global South and in European countries like Portugal and Spain...In these places mining is causing ecological devastation, while new mining proposals are full of irregularities, lack transparency and are faced with growing resistance from local citizens, which is being ignored. "Far from achieving a ‘green transition’, the Commission’s current plans effectively push for business as usual in line with European interests, at the cost of communities and the Earth.”...

Plans to expand mining globally to meet the massive projected growth in mineral and metal demand, partly driven by transitions to renewable energy, could undermine climate change mitigation efforts by destroying biodiverse ecosystems essential to the functioning of the global climate system...

Hal Rhoades, northern European coordinator of the Yes to Life, No to Mining Network, said: "We cannot mine our way out of the climate crisis."

“To display true climate leadership, the EC needs to establish and put in place policies for a low-energy, low-material transition in Europe, with a far greater focus on demand reduction and recycling. It also needs to contribute a fair share of support to Global South nations to redress the relentless, centuries-long extraction of wealth from the South to Europe.”