TUHH Open Research
 

Sustainability in critical raw materials for energy transition: identification of sustainability indicators and categories through a systematic literature review

First published in
IFIP advances in information and communication technology  
Number in series
808
Start Page
181
End Page
194
Citation
45th International Conference on Advances in Production Management Systems, APMS 2026
Contribution to Conference
45th International Conference on Advances in Production Management Systems, APMS 2026  
Publisher DOI
10.1007/978-3-032-38594-9_13
Publisher
Springer
ISBN of container
978-3-0323-8594-9
978-3-0323-8593-2
978-3-0323-8596-3
The global energy transition is driving rapidly increasing demand for critical raw materials (CRMs) used in electric mobility, renewable energy generation, and other low-carbon production systems. While these materials are essential for decarbonization, their extraction and supply chains are associated with significant environmental and social impacts and are characterized by high geopolitical and supply risks. At the same time, sustainability-related evidence for CRM supply chains remains fragmented across studies, indicators, and assessment approaches, limiting comparability and integration into manufacturing-oriented decision support. This paper addresses this gap by identifying and structuring sustainability indicators for CRM supply chains. A systematic literature review of peer-reviewed studies is conducted following a PRISMA-based selection process. Based on this analysis, the study derives a harmonized set of core environmental and social indicators and examines how their relevance varies across materials, with a particular focus on lithium, cobalt, and neodymium. The results show that environmental indicators are more mature and consistently operationalized than social indicators, while material-specific differences remain important, particularly for lithium, cobalt, and neodymium. Building on these findings, the paper proposes a two-layer indicator framework consisting of a general baseline enabling cross-material comparability and a material-specific layer capturing dominant sustainability hotspots. The framework provides a structured and reusable basis for data extraction, model development, life cycle assessment, supply risk analysis, and decision-support for sustainable manufacturing and CRM supply chains.
Subjects
Critical Raw Materials
Sustainable Manufacturing
Supply Chain Management
Sustainability Assessment
Systematic Literature Review
DDC Class
338: Production