Developments in Know-how Drive Demand for Specialised Supplies

Generative synthetic intelligence has turn into extensively accepted as a instrument that will increase productiveness. But the expertise is much from mature. Massive language fashions advance quickly from one era to the following, and consultants can solely speculate how AI will have an effect on the workforce and peoples’ day by day lives.

As a supplies scientist, I’m interested by how supplies and the applied sciences that derive from them have an effect on society. AI is one instance of a expertise driving world change – notably by way of its demand for supplies and uncommon minerals.

However earlier than AI advanced to its present stage, two different applied sciences exemplified the method created by the demand for specialised supplies: vehicles and smartphones.

Typically, the mass adoption of a brand new invention modifications human conduct, which ends up in new applied sciences and infrastructures reliant upon the invention. In flip, these new applied sciences and infrastructures require new or improved supplies – and these typically comprise essential minerals: these minerals which are each important to the expertise and pressure the provision chain.

The unequal distribution of those minerals provides leverage to the nations that produce them. The ensuing energy shifts pressure geopolitical relations and drive the seek for new mineral sources. New expertise nurtures the mining business.

The automotive and the event of suburbs

Originally of the twentieth century, solely 5 out of 1,000 individuals owned a automotive, with annual manufacturing round a number of thousand. Employees commuted on foot or by tram. Inside a two-mile radius, many individuals had all they wanted: from groceries to {hardware}, from college to church, and from shoemakers to docs.

Then in 1913, Henry Ford reworked the business by inventing the meeting line. Now, a center class household might afford a automotive: Mass manufacturing minimize the value of the Mannequin T from US$850 in 1908 to $360 in 1916. Whereas the Nice Melancholy dampened the broad adoption of the automotive, gross sales started to extend once more after the tip of World Battle II.

With vehicles got here extra mobility, and many individuals moved farther away from work. Within the Nineteen Forties and Nineteen Fifties, a robust freeway foyer that included oil, vehicle and building pursuits promoted federal freeway and transportation insurance policies, which elevated vehicle dependence. These insurance policies helped change the panorama: Homes have been spaced farther aside, and situated farther away from the city facilities the place many individuals labored. By the Sixties, two-thirds of American employees commuted by automotive, and the typical commute had elevated to 10 miles.

Public coverage and funding favored suburbs, which meant much less funding in metropolis facilities. The ensuing decay made dwelling in downtown areas of many cities undesirable and triggered city renewal tasks.

Lengthy commutes added to air pollution and bills, which created a requirement for lighter, extra fuel-efficient vehicles. However constructing these required higher supplies.

In 1970, the complete body and physique of a automotive was constituted of one metal kind, however by 2017, 10 totally different, extremely specialised steels constituted a car’s lightweight kind. Every metal accommodates totally different chemical components, reminiscent of molybdenum and vanadium, that are mined solely in a number of nations.

Whereas the automotive provide chain was largely home till the Nineteen Seventies, the automotive business as we speak depends closely on imports. This dependence has created pressure with worldwide commerce companions, as mirrored by greater tariffs on metal.

The cellphone and American life

The cellphone presents one other instance of a expertise creating a requirement for minerals and affecting overseas coverage. In 1983, Motorola launched the DynaTAC, the primary industrial cellular telephone. It was heavy, costly and its battery lasted for under half an hour, so few individuals had one. Then in 1996, Motorola launched the flip telephone, which was cheaper, lighter and extra handy to make use of. The flip telephone initiated the mass-adoption of cell telephones. Nevertheless, it was nonetheless only a telephone: In contrast to as we speak’s smartphones, all it did was ship and obtain calls and texts.

In 2007, Apple redefined communication with the iPhone, inventing the contact display and integrating an web navigator. The telephone turned a digital hub for navigating, discovering data and constructing a web-based social identification. Earlier than smartphones, cellphones supplemented day by day life. Now, they construction it.

In 2000, fewer than half of American adults owned a cellphone, and practically all who did it solely sporadically. In 2024, 98% of People over the age of 18 reported proudly owning a cellphone, and over 90% owned a smartphone.

With out the smartphone, most individuals can not fulfill their day by day duties. Many people now expertise nomophobia: They really feel anxious with out a cellphone.

Round three quarters of all steady components are represented within the parts of every smartphone. These components are mandatory for extremely specialised supplies that allow contact screens, shows, batteries, audio system, microphones and cameras. Many of those components are important for at the least one perform and have an unreliable provide chain, which makes them essential.

Essential supplies and AI

Essential supplies give leverage to nations which have a monopoly in mining and processing them. For instance, China has gained elevated energy by way of its monopoly on uncommon earth components. In April 2025, in response to U.S. tariffs, China stopped exporting uncommon earth magnets, that are utilized in cellphones. The geopolitical tensions that resulted show the ability embodied within the management over essential minerals.

The mass adoption of AI expertise will doubtless change human conduct and convey forth new applied sciences, industries and infrastructure on which the U.S. economic system will rely. All of those applied sciences would require extra optimized and specialised supplies and create new materials dependencies.

By exacerbating materials dependencies, AI might have an effect on geopolitical relations and reorganize world energy.

America has wealthy deposits of many essential minerals, however extraction of those minerals comes with challenges. Elements together with gradual and dear allowing, public opposition, environmental issues, excessive funding prices and an insufficient workforce all can forestall mining corporations from accessing these assets. The mass adoption of AI is already including strain to beat these elements and improve accountable home mining.

Whereas the trail from innovation to materials dependence spanned a century for vehicles and a few many years for cell telephones, the fast development of huge language fashions means that the dimensions will likely be measured in years for AI. The warmth is already on.