Material fingerprinting of critical raw materials as part of an integrated approach towards due diligence certification: the MaDiTraCe project

The complexity and increasingly intricate nature of global industrial value chains is a challenge to transparency and due diligence. From the US Dodd-Frank Act enacted in 2010 (currently under revision), via the OECD and Chinese Due Diligence Guidances to the 2024 EU Directive on corporate sustainability due diligence, national and supranational legislation has reinforced control on the provenance of critical raw materials and fostered the need for traceability approaches. The EU project MaDiTraCe (2023-2026, https://www.maditrace.eu), develops synergies between digital product traceability solutions, material fingerprinting (MFP), using the intrinsic properties of CRMs and derived intermediate and final products, and artificial tagging. Four commodities, crucial for batteries and magnet value chains, are targeted: cobalt, lithium, natural graphite and rare earths. Here we present an overview on the MFP approach of the project with a special focus on lithium, throughout its value chains, from lithium deposits (hard rocks, salars, geothermal fluids) to batteries. A wide range of on-site and lab-based analytical techniques has been tested on reference samples of ores, concentrates and products and evaluated for their discriminatory power when combined with advanced data analysis. Implementation of this novel, hybrid approach including digital and material technology into the CERA 4in1 mineral raw material certification (https://www.maditrace.eu/cera4in1) system is underway.