The Copper Crunch Threatening AI – and Alaska’s Untapped U.S. Solution

The Trump Administration’s transformative blueprint to ensure the United States wins the global artificial intelligence race followed an equally prescient March 20 executive order to boost domestic production of critical minerals including copper.  

All of these minerals are essential to AI dominance, semiconductors, energy and military hardware – all of which are critical to national security. But there is a major shortage ahead for copper, the third-most commonly used industrial metal behind iron and aluminum, which would stand in the way of these ambitious and achievable plans.  

At a time when much of the world’s copper supply flows through China, demand for the metal is expected to surge 50% by 2040 because of AI, robotics and defense needs. Yet the global supply may lag projected demand by 10 million metric tons, a deficit that S&P Global in a new report said constitutes a “systemic risk” for global industries, technology advancement, and economic growth. 

Yet, a potent American solution exists in plain sight. It’s the Pebble project in southwest Alaska, the world’s largest undeveloped copper resource.  

The Final Environmental Impact Statement, published in July 2020 and led by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, is a transparent, science-driven and objective technical review demonstrating that the Pebble deposit can be responsibly developed. It reflects input from 11 cooperating government entities and 35 Bristol Bay and Cook Inlet tribal governments and draws on 15 years of independent research and $150 million in environmental studies. 

What has stopped the project from moving forward is a highly unusual U.S. Environmental Protection Agency pre-emptive veto of the project in 2023, which followed hundreds of emails from environmental activists to the then-EPA Administrator of the Biden Administration.  

Pebble has brought a legal case against the EPA actions of the Biden Administration, and a settlement agreement with the current one has yet to happen. Pebble has been joined by the State of Alaska, two Alaska Native Village Corporations, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Mining Association, the American Exploration and Mining Association and numerous Alaska business groups in this litigation. 

The Trump Administration can reverse the veto and allow the project to move forward. Such an action would be in line with the many strong initiatives President Trump has taken to secure America’s future and advance Alaska’s ability to serve the nation with its natural bounty – responsibly and safely.  

President Trump holds an opportunity here to bolster his own executive actions and further upgrade America’s ability to meet its most critical needs self-sufficiently. He has moved boldly on the minerals front to reduce our foreign dependence on essential materials and strengthen our U.S. industrial capacity and energy supplies. 

Under the March 20 executive order concerning critical minerals, agencies must compile a list of all mineral production projects like Pebble that have submitted a plan of operations, permit applications, or other approval requests to expedite the review and advancement of those projects in coordination with his National Energy Dominance Council.  

Pebble will deliver thousands of high-paying jobs and long-term investment, while serving America’s national security and domestic mining needs. .  

By lifting the veto, the Trump Administration can demonstrate powerfully and tangibly that the U.S. is serious about supplanting China’s dominance in critical minerals and re-establishing American sovereignty over our own resources, unencumbered from certain interests that would prefer other nations mine what we have and need. President Trump has been clear: the U.S. shouldn’t be beholden to any foreign power for minerals and metals we can obtain from our own national bounty.  

In the age of AI, what Pebble offers the U.S. has never been more valuable to our national security and economic sovereignty. With the stroke of a pen, Pebble can become an unmistakably American asset that combines our strongest traits of innovation, responsibility, self-sufficiency – and serves our future.    

John Shively is CEO of the Pebble Partnership, which is developing the Pebble Project, and is a former Alaska Natural Resources Commissioner.