National Critical Mineral Mission
Why it matters?
The Ministry of Mines has designated seven premier institutes—including 4 IITs (Bombay, Hyderabad, ISM Dhanbad, Roorkee and 3 R&D labs (CSIR-IMMT Bhubaneswar, CSIR-NML Jamshedpur, NFTDC Hyderabad)—as Centres of Excellence under the National Critical Mineral Mission.
What you should know?
Critical minerals include lithium, cobalt, nickel, rare earths, graphite, etc., crucial for batteries, solar panels, EVs, and electronics.
The objective of the mission is to promote R&D across the entire value chain of critical minerals—from exploration to advanced processing and application.
The hub-and-spoke model will be adopted, with each CoE forming a consortium of at least 2 industry and 2 R&D/academic partners.
National Critical Mineral Mission
The National Critical Mineral Mission (NCMM) has been launched by the Ministry of Mines in 2025.
The mission aims to ensure secure and resilient supply chains of critical minerals necessary for clean energy, strategic technologies, and national self-reliance.
The mission focuses on the entire value chain: exploration, extraction, processing, refining, recycling, and substitution of critical minerals.
NCMM promotes research and development (R&D) to achieve higher Technology Readiness Levels (TRL 7/8) for deployment of technologies.
It is critical to meet India’s climate targets – 45% reduction in emissions intensity by 2030, 50% electricity from non-fossil sources, and net zero by 2070.