Toward a New Geopolitics of Raw Materials in the Energy Transition

This chapter aims to study the new economic or geopolitical dependencies that may appear in the dynamics of the global energy transition. It presents the concept of criticality established to measure the dependence of states on strategic materials and insists on the difficult consideration of geopolitical aspects. The chapter follows Gemechu et al. in their attempt to refine and quantify “geopolitical risk” by setting aside the Herfindahl Hirschman Index and defining the “geopolitical risk” attributed to a producer country as the sum of the risks proportionally related to its contribution to an importing country's imports and its political stability. It defines, on the basis of the assessments of the demand for raw materials, an indicator of geological criticality, which discusses in the light of geo-economics and geopolitics. The chapter examines the public policies of states to manage this new geopolitical situation.