The potential intersection between mining and AI just got a whole lot wider, and richer, with the formal announcement of the US$500 billion Stargate artificial intelligence infrastructure initiative in the US. But mining must not become “the bottleneck for the future growth and prosperity of the world”, the 2025 Future Minerals Forum heard.
Open AI, with a staggering $100 billion opening investment, NVIDIA, Microsoft, Oracle Corp, SoftBank Group and Arm Holdings were some of the names standing beside new US government unveiling of the Stargate Project, which sits in line with president Donald Trump’s vow to improve US national security capacities.
The Future Minerals Forum, which has just drawn more than 20,000 people to the King Abdulaziz International Conference Centre in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, heard the global AI “business” had gone from $50 billion to $200 billion in 12 months
“The energy transition, which is important, is going to happen in the next 20-to-30 years,” the CEO of New York-listed Ecolab, Christophe Beck, told the forum.
“There’s another major trend that’s happening, which is called AI, that’s going to happen in the next two-to-three years.
“In fact, the AI transition is happening as we speak.
“There’s one data centre being built every one or two weeks today … [at] between $500 million and $3 billion a piece. It’s moving at that speed right now.
“AI will require a lot of minerals, for sure … but it’s estimated that AI in the next five years will need the power equivalent of the whole of India and the water equivalent of the drinking needs of the United States.
“And I would bet it’s going to go even faster than that.”
Eduardo Zamanillo, a senior leader at top global mining consulting firm, SLR Consulting, says the Stargate Project is “not just an AI investment, it marks the beginning of a new era in mining”.
“With a four-year timeline for completion this project is set to transform the demand for critical minerals, reshape mining investment strategies, and redefine global geopolitical dynamics,” he said.
“Throughout history technological revolutions have been closely tied to the discovery and exploitation of new energy sources and materials.
“From coal and iron in the Industrial Revolution to silicon and rare earth elements in the digital age, mining has always been a foundation of human progress.
“Now, with artificial intelligence (AI) scaling to industrial levels, demand for certain critical minerals is about to skyrocket.”
Zamanillo said construction of massive AI infrastructure could lead to “unprecedented demand” for copper, lithium, cobalt, rare earths, nickel and aluminium.
Beyond direct mineral demand it would drive higher consumption of steel, cement and construction materials, and new transportation and logistics networks for mineral supply chains.
Zamanillo said the announcement underscored the urgency around new investment in mining, including at the exploration stage and in project development – a vibe that was in evidence in all corners of the Riyadh event.
While the Trump government has put an early spotlight on Alaska’s copper, nickel and rare earth elements, many US domestic mineral projects sit well outside the Stargate (and other Trump agenda projects) ramp-up horizon.
The Future Minerals Forum heard about competing demands across growth industries for mineral resources, funding, energy, water and people.
Beck’s focus, given Ecolab’s position as a global water technology and services leader, was on the real risks around availability of H20 for industries and societies. He said corporations and governments around the world were focusing increasingly on water efficiency and curbing demand while at the same time improving business outcomes. Technology was a major driver.
Jon Stanton, CEO of UK-listed mining and mineral processing equipment company, Weir Group, said a similar focus on efficiency had to be dialled up significantly in an industry aiming to increase production manifestly from existing sites over the next decade.
“There is a massive opportunity on existing mines to drive more efficiency,” he said at FMF 2025.
“We think that most mines around the world are somewhat inefficient.
“And up to 30 or 40% of what goes through a concentrator is just recirculating load which is waste.
“The mining industry needs to scale up and clean up.
“It needs to scale up to deliver the copper, the battery metals and the resources that are going to be required to enable the energy transition, but it needs to clean up, use less energy, use less water, be less impactful on communities, on biodiversity, and so on.
“That cleanup piece is going to require innovation, technology and engineering to problem solve and create the solutions that are necessary for the industry to deliver.
“We’re certainly starting to feel that our customers are much more receptive to the adoption of newer technologies … and that’s because when you put that scale-up and clean-up challenge together it’s a real burning platform for the world, literally.
“And when I talk about technology it’s not [about] the mine of the future.
“We’ve heard AI is here – it’s now [and] it’s ready. There are use cases out there that we’re piloting right now and we’re on the cusp of something very big from an AI point of view.
“But it’s also the [existing] equipment and hardware as well. There is equipment available today [with] new flow sheets, new processes, which is capable of significantly reducing energy consumption, reducing water consumption and providing safer and less impactful environmental processes.”
While the speed of delivery of new mine production has slowed to historically protracted levels due to permitting delays and what one FMF 2025 speaker described as a “perfect storm in the industry in terms of incentivising capital formation” to back projects, people and talent shortages are increasingly being pinpointed as a real growth retarder for the industry.
Particularly in an era when technology is expected to play a bigger role in driving efficiency and production outcomes, and competition for talent in the tech space has never been more fierce.
“One of the challenges we all need to really face as an industry is this battle to attract talent,” said the CEO of Xcalibur Smart Mapping, Andres Blanco.
“And here you’re competing with Facebook and all these new companies.
“Without this talent it is very difficult to do anything with the machines.”
Sami Takaluoma, CEO of Finnish mining and mineral processing equipment manufacturer, Metso, said: “It’s very clear the world – regardless if there is an energy transition or anything – is going to be needing more metals in the future.
“Our challenge as an industry is to make sure [we have] the innovative teams that we need to make sure that we are able to produce what the world needs, so that we are not going to be the bottleneck as an industry for the future growth and prosperity of the world.”
Dr Robert Johnston, senior research director at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy, said government policy that encouraged new community, finance and technology partnerships could help address some of the urgent questions forming around the energy transition, artificial intelligence and critical mineral supply.
But perhaps the major area requiring “innovation on the policy front” to better enable robust and resilient new supply lines to form was the now opaque one of international trade.
“That might be the most challenging one,” Johnston said at FMF 2025.
“Because everything that we’re talking about here with the energy transition, with building more data centres, making better use of AI [and] economic development is built on the assumption of a frictionless global trade system and global political cooperation.
“How do we sustain that at a time of economic conflict, political conflict, even military conflict, in some cases?
“And if we can’t do it at the global level, what can we do at the regional level?”