Mitsubishi Materials Corporation and Mitsubishi Materials Europe B.V. (Amsterdam, the Netherlands; “MMEU”) are pleased to announce that the European secondary raw materials smelting project “3ECYCLE” was selected on 9 October as a Strategic Project under the EU Critical Raw Materials Act (“CRMA”).
3ECYCLE, which has been selected as a Strategic Project, is a secondary raw materials smelting project being developed by the Mitsubishi Materials Group in the Netherlands. In its Medium-term Management Strategy for the fiscal years March 2027–2029, the Mitsubishi Materials Group has set “Toward Becoming a Company Creating the Future through Resource Circulation” as its basic policy and identifies the sustainable utilization of resources, including the circular use of secondary resources as key strategic priorities. The European 3ECYCLE project is one of the Group’s initiatives to advance these commitments, supporting its ambition to promote resource circularity and contribute to a more sustainable, circular economy. By using E-scrap as its primary feedstock and recovering and recycling copper and other valuable metals, 3ECYCLE aims to contribute to the acceleration of the circular economy and the stable supply of strategic raw materials in Europe.
Under the CRMA, Strategic Projects are selected by the European Commission as projects that make a meaningful contribution to the security of supply of the EU’s strategic raw materials. They are assessed against criteria including their contribution to security of supply, technical feasibility, sustainability and cross-border benefits, and are positioned as key projects supporting the CRMA’s objective of ensuring a secure and sustainable supply of strategic raw materials. Being recognized as a Strategic Project is expected to provide various forms of support for the smooth implementation of the project.
Guided by its core circularity principle to create the future through resource circulation, the Mitsubishi Materials Group will continue to explore the commercialization of 3ECYCLE by leveraging the non-ferrous metal smelting and recycling technologies it has developed over many years. Through this project, the Mitsubishi Materials Group will promote the circular use of secondary raw materials within Europe and contribute to the stable supply of copper and other strategic raw materials, as well as to the further development of the circular economy in Europe.
