America’s energy and tech future hinges on a set of raw materials most consumers barely think about, rare earth elements like lithium, cobalt, graphite, nickel, vanadium and manganese. But unlike oil, U.S. supply chains for these critical minerals are dangerously fragmented. According to the Environmental and Energy Study Institute, in 2024 the U.S. was 100% import-reliant for 12 critical minerals, and it was more than 50% import-reliant for an additional 28 minerals on the list making the country uniquely vulnerable to external disruptions.

That pressure becomes quite visible in trade data. Visual Capitalist shows the U.S. heavy reliance on imports, with more than 100% import dependence for elements like manganese and fluorspar, materials which are essential to batteries, semiconductors, and defense systems. For graphite, a core EV battery input, U.S. import reliance also sits at 100%, rendering manufacturers exposed to even minor export disruptions. The dependency extends well beyond rare-earth headlines. Antimony is 85% import reliant with 54% coming from China, and bismuth which is 89% reliant versus 60% China imported, these remain critical inputs for electronics, and energy systems. Even industrial materials often overlooked such as aluminum oxide which is at 95% reliance, with 61% from China and silicon carbide sits at 69% reliance. This accentuates how deeply embedded Chinese supply is across U.S. manufacturing value chains. 

China looms large in this landscape not because it supplies most U.S. imports, but because it controls the choke points that matter most. Macquarie’s modelling shows that while Chinese minerals make up about $2 billion, or roughly 3% of total U.S. critical mineral imports, the U.S. remains around 80% import-reliant for rare earth compounds and metals, with nearly 70% of those volumes sourced from China. That concentration creates outsized risk: export controls on just four rare earths: samarium, lutetium, terbium, dysprosium could cut more than $1 billion from the U.S. GDP in a single year. This effectively bottlenecks the entire supply chain regardless of where the ore is mined, this leverage translates into an economic risk. 

Demand itself isn’t slowing either. Critical minerals are essential inputs for clean energy technologies from lithium, nickel, and cobalt in EV batteries to rare earth elements in permanent magnets for wind turbines and materials in solar panels illustrating how the energy transition drives sustained demand for these raw materials. America’s mineral insecurity is structural and increasingly visible. With demand accelerating and supply chains tightly concentrated, small policy shifts can trigger outsized economic shocks. Until domestic production, processing, and allied sourcing scale meaningfully, the U.S. remains exposed, navigating the energy transition with critical materials it neither controls nor can easily replace.