Austria Masterplan Rohstoffe 2030 — Federal Raw Materials Strategy

Mechanism

The Masterplan Rohstoffe 2030 operates across six strategic dimensions:

1. Primary supply security — defines Austria's regulatory architecture for mining-permit issuance under the Mineralrohstoffgesetz (MinroG), covering aggregates, industrial minerals, and metallic ores. Sets framework for exploration-licensing and domestic extraction to reduce import dependence for construction minerals and industrial inputs.

2. Secondary raw materials / circular economy — establishes policy priorities for urban mining, end-of-life material recovery, industrial-residue utilisation, and secondary-feedstock substitution. Austria has a well-developed waste-management sector and the plan frames integration of secondary streams into primary industrial supply chains.

3. EU CRMA alignment — serves as Austria's national implementation instrument for EU Critical Raw Materials Act 2024/1252 obligations on strategic-projects identification, stockpiling readiness, and supply-chain diversification benchmarks. Pre-dates the CRMA by three years but was explicitly referenced in Austria's CRMA implementation consultations.

4. R&D and substitution research — frames public-funding priorities (via FFG, the Austrian Research Promotion Agency) for materials-substitution research and processing-technology development. Directly relevant to Austrian heavy-industry users including voestalpine (steel/special metals), RHI Magnesita (refractory materials), Plansee Group (tungsten/molybdenum), and Treibacher (rare earths/specialty chemicals).

5. Acceptance and social licence — the plan addresses public acceptance of domestic mining operations, recognising that permitting delays and community opposition constrain Austrian primary extraction despite adequate geological endowment. Proposes stakeholder-dialogue frameworks (Rohstoffdialog) to reduce procedural friction.

6. Annual monitoring framework — Monitoringberichte issued in 2023, 2024, and 2025 track implementation KPIs including permit-issuance rates, secondary-material recovery volumes, and supply-security indicators for critical minerals consumed by Austrian industry.

Downstream implications

• voestalpine and RHI Magnesita are the highest-exposure Austrian industrial consumers of critical and specialty minerals — both face direct supply-chain due-diligence expectations under the monitoring architecture.
• Plansee Group (tungsten/molybdenum) and Treibacher (rare earths) benefit from the R&D and substitution-research funding framework as domestic processors.
• The plan pre-positioned Austria for EU CRMA Strategic Project designation processes; Austrian mining projects applying for CRMA status can reference Masterplan alignment in applications.
• The FFG Rohstoffe-Zukunft-Sichern funding programme is the operational implementation of the plan's R&D pillar.

Open questions

• How many Austrian projects have received CRMA Strategic Project designation post-2024?
• Has the MinroG been amended to reflect Masterplan permit-streamlining objectives?
• Do the 2024–2025 Monitoringberichte show measurable improvement in secondary-feedstock substitution ratios for voestalpine/RHI?