Rio Tinto and the race for copper: how the AI boom is forcing the US to scramble for more output

Artificial intelligence is reshaping not only the market for chips and cloud services but also the world's raw-materials map. As companies build new data centers and expand power systems to handle AI loads, copper is becoming one of the scarcest and most strategically important materials. For the US this is especially sensitive: domestic production of the metal has stagnated for decades, and import dependence grew just as the need for reliable energy infrastructure began to accelerate sharply.

Copper is needed at almost every level of AI infrastructure. It is used in cables, transformers, distribution systems, cooling systems, electric motors and networking equipment. The more data centers come online, the greater the load not only on server racks but also on power lines, substations and regional grids. As a result, two processes are pushing demand at once: the build-out of computing capacity to train and run models, and the parallel modernization of power grids, without which all this growth simply cannot be physically powered. AI does not replace existing energy consumption but is layered on top of it, so requirements for grid capacity and reserves are growing much faster than before.

The US problem is that domestic copper mining has long failed to grow at a pace matching the new industrial cycle. The industry has effectively lost momentum: old capacity was not offset by new, and the launch of major projects was repeatedly postponed. Against this backdrop, the Resolution project in Arizona, developed by Rio Tinto, stands out.

It shows two things at once. First, the country still has large undeveloped resources. Second, turning them into real supply to the market is extremely hard.

New mines require years of approvals, environmental reviews, infrastructure investment and enormous capital. Even when a project looks promising on paper, the road from licenses to commercial production can take years, and sometimes more than a decade.

Costs add further pressure. The price of construction, equipment, energy and labor is rising, and timelines for such projects are becoming less and less predictable. For investors this means higher risk, and for industry it means the likelihood that domestic supply will not keep pace with demand. Moreover, copper demand in the AI era cannot simply be postponed: data centers, new transmission lines and generation facilities are being built now, and a delay in material supplies quickly turns into a delay in construction. If the US cannot ramp up copper mining and processing fast enough, the market will cover the shortfall with imports, amid increasingly fierce global competition for raw materials.

Processing is a separate strategic issue. Even if domestic mining grows, control of the value chain depends not only on mines but also on concentration, smelting and refining capacity. China holds a strong position here: it plays a key role in global processing and can influence the balance of supply. This changes the nature of the debate itself: it is no longer only about the profitability of raw-materials projects but about who controls the critical infrastructure of the new technology wave.

As a result, for the US the question comes down to industrial resilience, energy security and the ability to build infrastructure quickly for a new wave of computing. The main takeaway is that the AI boom is launching not only a race of models, accelerators and data centers but also a far less visible race for basic materials. Copper is becoming a bottleneck for power grids and digital infrastructure, and therefore a factor in national competitiveness.

If the US wants to keep pace in the AI economy, it will have to tackle several tasks at once: speed up permitting, lower investment barriers and rebuild its own production chain. Otherwise the key resource of the AI era will continue to be controlled by external suppliers, and the pace of the AI sector's growth will depend not only on chips and models but also on how quickly the country can mine and process metal.