Regulation (EU) 2024/1252 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 April 2024 establishing a framework for ensuring a secure and sustainable supply of critical raw materials and amending Regulations (EU) No 168/2013, (EU) 2018/858, (EU) 2018/1724 and (EU) 2019/1020 (Text with EEA relevance)

CHAPTER 1

GENERAL PROVISIONS

Article 1

Subject matter and objectives

To achieve the general objective referred to in paragraph 1, this Regulation lays down measures aiming to:

(a) lower the risk of supply disruptions related to critical raw materials likely to distort competition and fragment the internal market, in particular by identifying and supporting strategic projects that contribute to lowering dependencies and diversifying imports and by undertaking efforts to incentivise technological progress and resource efficiency in order to moderate the expected increase in the Union consumption of critical raw materials;

(b) improve the Union’s ability to monitor and mitigate the supply risk related to critical raw materials;

(c) ensure the free movement of critical raw materials and products containing critical raw materials placed on the Union market while ensuring a high level of environmental protection and sustainability, including by improving their circularity.

Article 2

Definitions

For the purposes of this Regulation, the following definitions apply:

(1) ‘raw material’ means a substance in processed or unprocessed state used as an input for the manufacturing of intermediate or final products, excluding substances predominantly used as food, feed or combustion fuel;

(2) ‘raw materials value chain’ means all activities and processes involved in the exploration, extraction, processing and recycling of raw materials;

(3) ‘exploration’ means all activities aimed at identifying and establishing the properties of mineral occurrences;

(4) ‘extraction’ means the extraction of ores, minerals and plant products from their original source as a main product or as a by-product, including from mineral occurrence underground, mineral occurrence under and in water, and from brine and trees;

(5) ‘Union extraction capacity’ means an aggregate of the maximum annual production volumes of extractive operations for ores, minerals, plant products and concentrates containing strategic raw materials, including processing operations that are typically located at or near the extraction site, located in the Union;

(6) ‘mineral occurrences’ means any single mineral or combination of minerals occurring in a mass or deposit of potential economic interest;

(7) ‘reserves’ means all mineral occurrences that are economically viable to extract in a particular market context;

(8) ‘processing’ means all physical, chemical and biological processes involved in the transformation of a raw material from ores, minerals, plant products or waste into pure metals, alloys or other economically usable forms, including beneficiation, separation, smelting and refining, and excluding metal working and further transformation into intermediate and final goods;

(9) ‘Union processing capacity’ means an aggregate of the maximum annual production volumes of processing operations for strategic raw materials, excluding such operations that are typically located at or near the extraction site, located in the Union;

(10) ‘recycling’ means recycling as defined in Article 3, point (17), of Directive 2008/98/EC;

(11) ‘Union recycling capacity’ means an aggregate of the maximum annual production volume of recycling operations for strategic raw materials after re-processing, including the sorting and pre-treatment of waste, and its processing into secondary raw materials, located in the Union;

(12) ‘annual consumption of strategic raw materials’ means an aggregate of the amount of strategic raw materials consumed by undertakings established in the Union in processed form, excluding strategic raw materials incorporated in intermediate or final products placed on the Union market;

(13) ‘supply risk’ means supply risk as calculated in line with Annex II, Section 2;

(14) ‘critical raw material project’ means any planned facility or planned significant extension or repurposing of an existing facility that is active in the extraction, processing or recycling of critical raw materials;

(15) ‘offtaker’ means an undertaking that has entered into an offtake agreement with a project promoter;

(16) ‘offtake agreement’ means any contractual agreement between an undertaking and a project promoter containing either a commitment on part of the undertaking to procure a share of the raw materials produced by a specific raw material project over a certain period of time or a commitment on part of the project promoter to provide the undertaking with the option to do so;

(17) ‘project promoter’ means any undertaking or consortium of undertakings developing a raw material project;

(18) ‘permit-granting process’ means a process covering all relevant permits to build and operate a critical raw material project, including building, chemical and grid connection permits and environmental assessments and authorisations where those are required, and encompassing all applications and procedures from the acknowledgment that the application is complete to the notification of the comprehensive decision on the outcome of the procedure by the single point of contact concerned;

(19) ‘comprehensive decision’ means the decision or set of decisions taken by Member State authorities that determines whether a project promoter is authorised to implement a critical raw material project, without prejudice to any decision taken in the context of an appeal procedure;

(20) ‘national programme’ means a national programme or a compiled set of programmes, covering the entire territory, prepared and adopted by relevant national or regional authorities;

(21) ‘general exploration’ means exploration at national or regional level, not including targeted exploration;

(22) ‘targeted exploration’ means the detailed investigation of an individual mineral occurrence;

(23) ‘predictive map’ means a map indicating areas that are likely to contain mineral occurrences of a given raw material;

(24) ‘supply disruption’ means the unexpected significant decrease in the availability of a raw material or significant increase in the price of a raw material beyond normal market price volatility;

(25) ‘raw materials supply chain’ means all activities and processes of the raw materials value chain up to the point where a raw material is used as an input for the manufacturing of intermediate or final products;

(26) ‘mitigation strategies’ means the policies developed by an economic operator to limit the likelihood of a supply disruption to its raw materials supply chain or to mitigate the damages caused by such a supply disruption to its economic activity;

(27) ‘key market operators’ means undertakings in the Union’s critical raw materials supply chain and downstream undertakings consuming critical raw materials, the reliable functioning of which is essential for the supply of critical raw materials;

(28) ‘strategic stock’ means a quantity of a particular raw material in whichever form that is stored by a public or private operator with a view to releasing it in the event of a supply disruption;

(29) ‘large company’ means a company with more than 500 employees on average and a net worldwide turnover of more than EUR 150 million in the most recent financial year for which annual financial statements have been prepared;

(30) ‘strategic technologies’ means the key technologies instrumental for the green and digital transitions as well as for defence and aerospace applications;

(31) ‘board of directors’ means the administrative or supervisory body responsible for supervising the executive management of the company, or, if no such body exists, the person or persons performing equivalent functions;

(32) ‘waste’ means waste as defined in Article 3, point (1), of Directive 2008/98/EC;

(33) ‘collection’ means collection as defined in Article 3, point (10), of Directive 2008/98/EC;

(34) ‘treatment’ means treatment as defined in Article 3, point (14), of Directive 2008/98/EC;

(35) ‘recovery’ means recovery as defined in Article 3, point (15), of Directive 2008/98/EC;

(36) ‘re-use’ means re-use as defined in Article 3, point (13), of Directive 2008/98/EC;

(37) ‘extractive waste’ means extractive waste within the meaning of Article 2(1) of Directive 2006/21/EC;

(38) ‘extractive waste facility’ means waste facility as defined in Article 3, point (15), of Directive 2006/21/EC;

(39) ‘preliminary economic assessment’ means an early-stage, conceptual assessment of the potential economic viability of a project for the recovery of critical raw materials from extractive waste;

(40) ‘magnetic resonance imaging device’ means a non-invasive medical device that uses magnetic fields to make anatomical images or any other device that uses magnetic fields to make images of the inside of object;

(41) ‘wind energy generator’ means the part of an onshore or offshore wind turbine that converts the mechanical energy of the rotor into electrical energy;

(42) ‘industrial robot’ means an automatically controlled, reprogrammable, multipurpose manipulator, programmable in three or more axes, which can either be fixed or mobile for use in industrial automation applications;

(43) ‘motor vehicle’ means any type-approved vehicle of the M or N categories as set out in Article 4(1), points (a) and (b), of Regulation (EU) 2018/858;

(44) ‘light means of transport’ means any light wheeled vehicle that can be powered by the electric motor alone or by a combination of motor and human power, including electric scooters, electric bicycles and type-approved vehicles of category L as set out in Article 4 of Regulation (EU) No 168/2013;

(45) ‘cooling generator’ means the part of a cooling system that generates a temperature difference allowing heat extraction from the space or process to be cooled, using an electric vapour compression cycle;

(46) ‘heat pump’ means the part of a heating system that generates a temperature difference allowing heat supply to the space or process to be heated, using an electric vapour compression cycle;

(47) ‘electric motor’ means a device that converts electrical input power into mechanical output power in the form of a rotation with a rotational speed and torque that depends on factors including the frequency of the supply voltage and number of poles of the motor, and with a rated output equal to or above 0,12  kW;

(48) ‘automatic washing machine’ means a washing machine where the load is fully treated by the washing machine without the need for user intervention at any point during the programme;

(49) ‘tumble drier’ means an appliance in which textiles are dried by tumbling in a rotating drum through which heated air is passed;

(50) ‘microwave’ means any appliance intended to be used for the heating of food using electromagnetic energy;

(51) ‘vacuum cleaner’ means an appliance that removes soil from a surface to be cleaned by means of an airflow created by underpressure developed within the unit;

(52) ‘dishwasher’ means a machine which cleans and rinses tableware;

(53) ‘permanent magnet’ means a magnet that retains its magnetism after being removed from an external magnetic field;

(54) ‘data carrier’ means a linear bar code symbol, a two-dimensional symbol or other automatic identification data capture medium that can be read by a device;

(55) ‘unique product identifier’ means a unique string of characters for the identification of products;

(56) ‘magnet coating’ means a layer of material generally used to protect magnets from corrosion;

(57) ‘removal’ means manual, mechanical, chemical, thermal or metallurgic handling with the result that the targeted components or materials are identifiable as a separate output stream or part of an output stream;

(58) ‘recycler’ means any natural or legal person who carries out recycling in a permitted facility;

(59) ‘making available on the market’ means any supply of a product for distribution, consumption or use on the Union market in the course of a commercial activity, whether in return for payment or free of charge;

(60) ‘critical raw material type’ means a critical raw material placed on the market that is differentiated by its stage of processing, its chemical composition, its geographical origin or the production methods used;

(61) ‘placing on the market’ means the first making available of a product on the Union market;

(62) ‘conformity assessment’ means the process demonstrating whether the requirements set out in Article 28, 29 or 31 have been fulfilled;

(63) ‘Strategic Partnership’ means a commitment between the Union and a third country or an overseas country or territory to increase cooperation related to the raw materials value chain that is established through a non-binding instrument setting out actions of mutual interest, which facilitate beneficial outcomes for both the Union and the relevant third country or overseas countries or territories;

(64) ‘multi-stakeholder governance’ means a formal, meaningful, and substantive role of multiple types of stakeholders, including at least civil society, in the decision-making of a certification scheme, documented by way of a mandate, terms of reference or other evidence, which confirms or supports the involvement of the multi-stakeholder representatives of that certification scheme.

CHAPTER 2

STRATEGIC AND CRITICAL RAW MATERIALS

Article 3

List of strategic raw materials

An updated list of strategic raw materials shall include, from among the raw materials assessed, the raw materials that score among the highest in terms of strategic importance, forecasted demand growth and difficulty of increasing production. The strategic importance, projected demand growth and difficulty of increasing production shall be determined in accordance with Annex I, Section 2.

Upon the request of the European Critical Raw Materials Board established in Article 35 (the ‘Board’) on the basis of monitoring and stress testing in accordance with this Regulation, the Commission shall review and, where appropriate, update the list of strategic raw materials at any time in addition to the regular reviews.

As part of the first update of the list of strategic raw materials pursuant to the first subparagraph, the Commission shall, in particular, assess whether, on the basis of its assessment pursuant to paragraph 2 of this Article and Annex I, Section 2, synthetic graphite should remain in the list of strategic raw materials.

Article 4

List of critical raw materials

An updated list of critical raw materials shall include the strategic raw materials listed in Annex I, Section 1, as well as any other raw material that reaches or exceeds the threshold of 1 for supply risk and 2,8 for economic importance. Economic importance and supply risk shall be calculated in accordance with Annex II, Section 2.

CHAPTER 3

STRENGTHENING THE UNION RAW MATERIALS VALUE CHAIN

SECTION 1

Benchmarks

Article 5

Benchmarks

The Commission and Member States shall strengthen the different stages of the strategic raw materials value chain through the measures provided for in this Chapter in order to:

(a) ensure that, by 2030, Union capacities for each strategic raw material have significantly increased so that, overall, Union capacity approaches or reaches the following benchmarks: (i) Union extraction capacity is capable of extracting the ores, minerals or concentrates needed to produce at least 10 % of the Union’s annual consumption of strategic raw materials, to the extent possible in light of the Union’s reserves; (ii) Union processing capacity, including for all intermediate processing steps, is capable of producing at least 40 % of the Union’s annual consumption of strategic raw materials; (iii) Union recycling capacity, including for all intermediate recycling steps, is capable of producing at least 25 % of the Union’s annual consumption of strategic raw materials and is capable of recycling significantly increasing amounts of each strategic raw material from waste;

(b) diversify the Union’s imports of strategic raw materials with a view to ensuring that, by 2030, the Union’s annual consumption of each strategic raw material at any relevant stage of processing can rely on imports from several third countries or from overseas countries or territories (OCTs) and that no third country accounts for more than 65 % of the Union’s annual consumption of such a strategic raw material.

The delegated acts adopted pursuant to the first subparagraph shall specify the waste streams and the strategic raw materials within them for which sufficient information on the relevant waste volumes and their strategic raw material content is available on the basis of the reporting requirements of Regulation (EU) 2023/1542, Directive 2000/53/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council (¹), Directive 2008/98/EC and Directive 2012/19/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council (²), to allow for estimating the Union recycling capacity as a share of the strategic raw materials contained in the relevant waste streams.

The delegated acts adopted pursuant to the first subparagraph shall also set a Union recycling capacity benchmark based on the recycling capacity for each strategic raw material in the relevant waste streams identified pursuant to the second subparagraph.

The Commission shall set the recycling capacity benchmark referred to in the third subparagraph on the basis of the following elements:

(a) current Union recycling capacity expressed as a share of the strategic raw materials available in relevant waste streams;

(b) the extent to which strategic raw materials can be recovered from those waste streams, taking into account technological and economic feasibility;

(c) targets set in other Union legal acts relevant to the recovery of strategic raw materials from waste.

The Commission is empowered to adopt delegated act in accordance with Article 38 to amend this Regulation by updating the delegated acts adopted pursuant to the first subparagraph of this paragraph if, as a result of the assessment referred to in Article 48(2), information becomes available on the relevant waste volumes and strategic raw material content of further waste streams.

SECTION 2

Strategic Projects

Article 6

Criteria for the recognition of Strategic Projects

Following an application of the project promoter and in accordance with the procedure established in Article 7, the Commission shall recognise as Strategic Projects raw material projects that meet the following criteria:

(a) the project would make a meaningful contribution to the security of the Union’s supply of strategic raw materials;