Regarding those minerals, Li, Ni, Co and Mn play an important role in electrification, but they don't have to. It's just that in recent decades we've built the production chains necessary for producing LIBs (Li-ion batteries), and now we're kinda stuck with that technology. Recently, NIBs (Na-ion batteries) started to become viable, and I really hope they manage to ramp up production quickly. Seems like the author of that article was thinking of LIBs all the time and forgot about NIBs. The problem is, it takes a long time to build the production capacity and production chains.

Then there's also copper. It's kinda hard to ignore that one, since we can't really electrify things when the grid can't handle the load. Also, electric motors require lots of copper, so I can imagine that the demand for copper will remain high in the coming decades.

I have had so many debates about so-called minerals depletion that I ended up giving people quick advice:

If you think a mineral is problematic, do two things:

1. Find the appropriate report of the USGS on that mineral. Here is the link. Note that "rare earth" is a report of its own but some of the minerals called that have a separate report.

2. Go read their definition of reserves and resources. This is not an optional step because that's where a lot of misunderstanding comes from.

3. I said step 2 is not optional, but in case you skipped it, here is a dumed down version

Or you could make devices more durable and repairable so they last longer.

Apple/Google/Motorola don’t need new flagship cellphones every fucking year.

People always want to protect their business and the status quo. To achieve this, any kind of sh1t story can be added to the narrative. Debunking is a big part of climate action.