MPs Sound Alarm Over U.K.’s Reliance on China for Critical Minerals

A probe from the United Kingdom's Parliament warns that the country is dangerously reliant on China for critical minerals used for the military, renewable energy infrastructure and artificial intelligence.

Parliament's investigation identified significant bottlenecks in the processing stage for seven categories of minerals, including refined lithium needed for electric vehicles, and rare earths used in fuselages and wings of military aircraft. Between now and 2030, demand for lithium in the U.K. is expected to increase 45-fold, while demand for rare earths used in military jets could rise by 16-fold.

China controls roughly a quarter of the world's lithium mining capacity, and accounts for more than two-thirds of the world's cobalt and lithium processing capacity.

"The U.K. is now dangerously dependent on supply chains that are dominated by China – and China’s newfound appetite for export controls has lit up how quickly this dependency has become a dangerous vulnerability," the report reads, pointing to rare earth export restrictions China enacted in 2025.

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