Critical minerals are essential to the U.S. economy and national security; however, their supply is vulnerable to disruption. U.S. production and refining of critical minerals has been declining for decades, while production has become more concentrated in fewer countries.
Given the urgency to increase and better secure critical mineral supply, DARPA partnered with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to launch the AI for Critical Mineral Assessment Competition in August 2022.
The partnership will help the USGS conduct assessments for more than 50 critical mineral resources to aid in economic planning and land-use decision-making. To do this, the USGS draws from over a century of accumulated data, contained mostly within geologic maps and reports, that provide the fundamental basis for these resource assessments.