The Globe and Mail reports in its Thursday, Nov. 30, edition that the vulnerability of net-zero goals to an adequate supply of critical minerals was exposed this week when the Panama Supreme Court declared First Quantum's contract to operate its Cobre Panama copper mine unconstitutional, prompting the Panamanian President to shut it down. The Globe's guest columnist Heather Exner-Pirot writes that the mine had been producing about 1.5 per cent of the world's copper. However, despite its importance to the Panamanian economy, accounting for about 5 per cent of GDP, there are forces looking to close the mine. S&P Global, a commodities consultancy, anticipates that a chronic shortfall in copper supply could reach 10 million tonnes by 2035, or about 20 per cent of what is needed to achieve net zero. It is not only countries in the Global South where copper production is being challenged. Consider that in 2023, federal agencies in the United States rejected projects for two, world-class deposits: the Pebble mine in southwest Alaska and the Twin Metals mine in Minnesota. Meanwhile, in Canada copper production is in a decades-long descent. Canadian refined copper production declined 43 per cent between 2005 and 2018.