Portugal's Secretary of State for Energy (Jean Paulo Gil Barroca) declared public utility and constituted an administrative easement over 24 land parcels (~228 hectares) of private and communal land in the Barroso mining concession area (Boticas, Trás-os-Montes) in favour of Savannah Lithium, Lda. via Despacho n.º 7824/2025, published in the Diário da República 2.ª série n.º 131 on 10 July 2025. The easement, valid for one year from administrative possession, grants Savannah Lithium access rights to conduct geological surveys, geotechnical investigations, and preparatory exploratory works at the Mina do Barroso — the EU's largest known spodumene (hard-rock lithium) resource. The Barroso project was designated a Strategic Project under the EU Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA) Regulation 2024/1252 in March 2025, making this despacho the first concrete member-state compulsory-easement instrument implementing CRMA Strategic Project status in Portugal.

Analyst notesShow

Mechanism

The Despacho uses Portugal's mining-law compulsory-servitude powers under the Decreto-Lei that governs mining concessions, enabling the concessionaire to temporarily access private and communal land parcels adjacent to the concession perimeter for exploratory and preparatory works without requiring individual landowner consent. The public-utility (utilidade pública) declaration triggers the administrative-law framework that overrides private property rights for a defined period and purpose, subject to compensation obligations.

The 24 parcels (~228 ha) cover land in Covas do Barroso and Romainho (municipalities within Boticas), straddling the Mina do Barroso concession boundary in Trás-os-Montes. The one-year duration runs from the date of formal administrative possession — a shorter window than a full expropriation, calibrated to the exploratory phase. Savannah Lithium Lda (Portuguese subsidiary of UK AIM-listed Savannah Resources plc, majority owner ~84%) holds the Barroso mining concession under a licence granted by the Direção-Geral de Energia e Geologia (DGEG).

The Barroso project was designated one of 60 Strategic Projects (47 EU + 13 third-country) under the EU CRMA Regulation 2024/1252 by the European Commission in March 2025, placing it on the EU's priority pipeline for lithium feedstock supply for battery-cell manufacturing under the 2030 target of 10% domestic EU extraction. The CRMA designation obliges member states to fast-track permitting for Strategic Projects to a maximum 27-month timeline — the Despacho is a downstream implementation step in that accelerated permitting track.

Downstream implications

Establishes the first precedent for a Portuguese compulsory-easement decree implementing the

EU CRMA Strategic Projects accelerated-permitting regime at member-state level; signals that Portugal will use administrative-law instruments to advance CRMA-designated projects over local landowner resistance.

Savannah Resources' development timeline depends on completing geotechnical and geological

baseline surveys over the affected parcels before proceeding to full Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) submission to the Agência Portuguesa do Ambiente (APA) — the easement unblocks that phase.

Persistent local and civil-society opposition (Associação Unidos em Defesa de Covas do Barroso,

Boticas municipality council) means further judicial challenges to the easement are possible; the one-year window may face precautionary-measure suspensions as occurred with earlier prospection-work authorisations in early 2025.

Portugal's position as host of the EU's largest spodumene deposit gives the Barroso project

strategic weight in EU battery-feedstock supply-chain planning; downstream offtake discussions involve EU battery-cell investors (Northvolt, Automotive Cells Company, ACC, Envision AESC European plants).