Abigail Hunter on Critical Minerals Innovation in US National Labs
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Abigail Hunter emphasizes the critical role of US National Labs as premier incubators for innovation in the discovery, extraction, processing, and utilization of essential minerals. As an advisor to Argonne National Lab, she advocates for strong partnerships between these government facilities and private sector companies, noting that this collaboration is vital because many of these initiatives are being undertaken for the first time. She argues that leveraging existing national lab infrastructure allows for efficient scaling once technologies move beyond their initial research phases, ensuring a smooth transition from experimental stages to commercial viability with continued government support.
A significant portion of her discussion focuses on managing the complex risks inherent in this new domain, which include both technological uncertainties and governance challenges related to public acceptance. Hunter points out that national labs play an indispensable role in addressing these concerns by validating processed minerals and manufactured products like grid batteries for end users. By demonstrating safety and efficacy through rigorous testing within trusted government environments, these institutions help build the necessary confidence among consumers and industries, thereby overcoming barriers that might otherwise stall adoption of new critical mineral technologies.
Looking toward the future, Hunter highlights key funding mechanisms such as programs from the Department of Energy (DOE), ARPA-E, and DARPA as essential drivers for this sector's growth. She asserts that these agencies have consistently run excellent programs but must remain a priority for further investment to ensure sustained momentum. The ultimate goal is to create an ecosystem where innovative practices can mature rapidly within national labs before being efficiently scaled by the broader economy, effectively bridging the gap between groundbreaking research and real-world application in energy storage and other critical industries.
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Can you talk about, you know, what works
on innovation? Are there innovative
practices that help, you know, discover,
extract, process, and use more critical
minerals in the US that are working or
that should be pursued further and and
and share a bit of a a view on
what what we can expect in the future on
that?
>> So, I'm an advisor to Argonne's National
Labs and so I'm like a big advocate of
leveraging our national labs who are
really incredible incubators of all of
these innovations
and need to be kind of partnered with
the US given that US companies
and across these different government
investments because we are doing this
for the first time and so I listed many
of the different risks that are just
born into this problem
and then you overlay that with any like
innovation technology risk and you need
to be able to kind of get end users
comfortable with that as well and so the
labs play a really important role in
making sure that people are comfortable
with those processed minerals, the
scaled
end product of the manufactured grid,
etc. And so we see a lot of that coming
out of DOE's national labs, ARPA-E, and
then DARPA and I think
they're always been great programs. We
need to make sure that they are first in
line for further government support and
that they're efficiently scaled once
they get out of those
TLR stages.
>> That's great and helpful to understand
the the messy world, right, of
of governance on this topic. So, thank
you, Abigail.