Rumor has it, the US is setting up a $5 billion fund to invest in mining and counter China's influence on global minerals supply chains. The US International Development Finance Corporation is in discussions with New York-based investment firm Orion Resource Partners to establish the fund as a joint venture.
Of course, the talks are private, and no one is giving any details on the record. But, on the heels of DOD's mega investment in MP Materials, the fund could provide the government with yet another path to engage in large-scale deals.
Congress is also working on ways to counter China's minerals dominance. A bipartisan Senate bill would bring together U.S. trading partners to counter China's manipulation of global markets. The "Restoring American Mineral Security Act" would authorize the U.S. Trade Representative to create a "Critical Minerals Security Alliance, whose members would share information around mining and processing, and zero out tariffs on critical minerals and certain related products like batteries and magnets traded between member countries. We'll see if there's enough bipartisan support to get it past the finish line.
We've been talking a lot about AI, data centers and their impact on electricity demand, and grid operators across the country are thinking about it too. PJM interconnection—our nation's largest grid, which covers 13-states, including Northern Virginia's massive data center hub—has a new proposal for data centers. The proposal would impact new data center operations that are not using energy they have developed or acquired for themselves. Under emergency situations, grid operators would cut off power to these data centers first, before ordering rolling blackouts elsewhere. The proposal would keep PJM from having to increase the system's capacity to meet the demand from new data centers; we'll see how these new data centers react to the promise of unpredictable generation.
