The US will treat essential raw materials for green technologies harvested or processed in the EU as if they came from the US. This has been agreed by the President of the European Commission, Ursula van der Leyen, and the President of the United States, Joe Biden. Van der Leyen visited Biden at the White House.
The yet-to-be-drafted deals should resolve a long-running conflict over US subsidies for green technology. EU countries felt the demands were equivalent to US protectionism. They feared that companies would invest in the US and therefore not invest money in productivity improvements in the EU.
Batteries for electric cars, for example, require a lot of metals and minerals. Europe wants them to be extracted here too, but if America supports those products from its own country, it will be bad for the European industry. The question is whether the deal can count on the support of US politicians.
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