Feedstock sovereignty in Europe and the US
The hosts:
Iris ten Have, Visionaries Tomorrow
Danielle Joseph, Closed Loop Partners
What is this Ripple about?
Feedstock dependency is being misdiagnosed as a competitiveness problem on both sides of the Atlantic. Cost competitiveness is the symptom. Dependency is the disease.The "competitiveness crisis" framing generates the wrong remedies (subsidies, regulation). The "sovereignty crisis" framing generates the right ones (domestic processing, strategic offtakes, and rules that keep recovered material in the region).
Why this topic timely or urgent in 2026
Export controls, price volatility, and shifting trade policy have ended the era of cheap, on-time inputs. Europe and the US are both responding, but not with the same playbook. Europe legislates targets and waits for capital to follow. The US is using tariffs, price floors, and direct equity, and investors are buying processing assets. This Ripple puts the two approaches side by side and works through which one actually gets capacity built.
Key questions or challenges being explored
Which feedstocks can Europe and the US realistically produce at cost parity, and which ones can't?
Does circularity get you to sovereignty, or only part of the way?
Once you have recovered material, how do you keep it? Scrap and black mass go to the highest bidder, which is usually the lowest-cost processor abroad.
Who are the first buyers that make local supply bankable, and what does it take to lock them in?
The main tension or debate at the heart of this discussion
Cost-competitive local supply is the durable answer for both sides of the Atlantic, but in many cases, the technologies and scale economics aren't all there yet. Every feedstock investment, policy decision, and offtake contract is an implicit bet on which side of that trade-off to accept.
Who would get the most value from attending this Ripple?
Startups, investors, and corporates in supply chains, chemicals, minerals.