Portfolio manager Tomasz Nadrowski, author of Mineral War: China’s Quest for Weapons of Mineral Destruction, warns that current single‑route supply chains for critical minerals lack sufficient parallel “flows” to balance volatile inflows and outflows in a non‑fungible global market. He argues that for many inputs, buyers effectively face a binary choice of sourcing from China or going without, given Beijing’s dominance in battery and rare earth capacity. Nadrowski advocates higher tariffs, price floors and targeted downstream manufacturing incentives to prevent further de‑industrialisation in Western economies.

James Miller has been appointed Commissioner of the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) for a three‑year term, taking responsibility for national rail, marine and aviation safety investigations. Miller brings more than 50 years’ aviation experience, including as Qantas Fleet Captain, into a role that shapes standards and incident analysis across complex, multi‑modal transport networks. For civil and transport engineers, his background suggests continued emphasis on data‑driven accident investigation, operational risk management and interface safety at rail and port infrastructure.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford has warned he is prepared to cut off both electricity exports and critical minerals to the United States after Trump imposed 50% tariffs on about US$20 billion of Canadian goods, including autos, auto parts and steel. Michigan currently receives about 6% of its power from Ontario via four cross-border transmission lines with 2,000 MW transfer capacity, and Ford has already imposed a 25% surcharge on electricity exports to Michigan, Minnesota and New York in 2025. Any suspension of Ontario shipments would hit US supply of high‑grade nickel from the Sudbury Basin (Vale, Glencore) and uranium refined at Cameco’s Blind River facility, the world’s largest commercial uranium refinery.