Strategic Materials: A Resource Challenge for India

About the Book

The scramble for natural resources is not a new phenomenon. Every state, either developed or developing, is always found busy ‘managing’ resources for its sustenance and growth. Minerals (also called materials) is one the crucial natural resource which plays a significant part in the development of both civilian and military industrial complexes of nation-states. There are a few minerals which are categorized as ‘strategic’ because of their importance for the industries and owing to natural and man-made difficulties in their procurement. This work debates the issues of strategic materials and their importance for nation-states. There has been an attempt here to contextualize the importance of strategic materials from a national security perspective. This study presents a macro view with regard to India’s strategic minerals architecture and undertakes analysis to understand current and futuristic challenges and opportunities in this sector, and offers a few recommendations based on the assessment undertaken. Issues related to Rare Earth and new materials are also discussed.

Contents

Acknowledgments
List of Figures and Tables
The Thought

1. Introduction
2. Strategic Materials: An Overview
   Mineral Chemistry
   Important Materials
   Elucidating Strategic Minerals
3. Global Distribution of Strategic Mineral Resources
   Africa
   Australia
   Brazil
   China
   India
   United States
4. Risk Assessment of India
   India’s Strategic Materials ‘Resource Management’ Assessment
   Broad Evaluation
   In closing
5. India’s Import Dependency
   DRC
   Australia
   Brazil
   China
   Russia
   United States
6. Challenges for the Indian Mining Sector
   Environmental Impacts of Mining
   Impacts of Open Pit Mining
   Threat fromNaxalism
   Illegal Mining
7. Rare Earth Materials
   What are REEs?
   Explicit REE Significance
   Global REE Deposits and Mining Processes
   REEs and China
   Challenging the Chinese Monopoly
   India and REEs
   REEs on the Critical List
   Wrapping up
8. Emerging Materials
   Graphene
   Germanane
   Stanene
   Metamaterials
   3D Printing Technology
   Molybdenum disulphide
   New Solar Cells
   Shape Memory Alloys
   Self-Healing Artificial Material
   Boron, Aluminium and Magnesium (BAM) ‘Ceramic’ Alloy
   Ceramic Matrix Composites (CMC)
   Qingsongite
9. Conclusion and Recommendations

APPENDICES
Appendix A: History of Mining and Evolution of Mineral Legislation in India
Appendix B: MMDR Act, 1957
Appendix C: MMDR Act, 1957; Amended up to 10th May, 2012
Appendix D: Press Release MMDR Bill, 2011, September 2011
Appendix E: Press Release MMDR Bill, August 2013

Index