Norway joins US-led minerals partnership FORGE
Five months after the Trump administration launched FORGE as a replacement for the Biden administration's MSP, the guiding principles were updated and Norway has joined.
August 16, 2026
Marte Gerhardsen speaking at Arendalsuka 26, photo: S&P
FORGE — Forum on Resource Geostrategic Engagement
FORGE was launched on 4 February 2026, at what was described as the largest diplomatic meeting on critical minerals in history. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio hosted, and representatives of 54 countries and the EU attended, among them 43 government ministers. Norway attended only with diplomats, as observers.
FORGE was launched as a replacement for the Biden administration's Minerals Security Partnership (MSP).
FORGE is intended to coordinate Western policy in order to accelerate investment, reshape the global pricing model and reduce dependence on Chinese supply chains. The cooperation is meant to provide guidelines, political support and geopolitical alignment in order to attract capital and establish a viable Western minerals industry.
The EU, Japan and the US issued a joint statement on mineral cooperation at the FORGE meeting. Norway held back, but ten days later, at the Munich Security Conference, teh Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store told TV2 that Norway was considering mineral cooperation with the US. Later that day, after a meeting with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Store appeared in a photograph with Rubio, who wrote that he looked forward to entering into mineral cooperation with Norway. S&P has previously reported that accommodation from the EU and Norway on the minerals question averted the ongoing NATO and Greenland crisis.
ATCM and the price floor as mechanism
The US aims to form a Western minerals alliance through a plurilateral trade agreement called the Agreement on Trade in Critical Minerals — ATCM. This is a binding agreement between the US and allied Western countries, at the core of which is the establishment of guaranteed minimum prices for every stage of the value chain. It is to be financed by the end customer and enforced through tariffs on countries outside the ATCM. The purpose is to make Western mineral projects financeable. Without a guaranteed floor price, China can push prices down at any time and render projects unprofitable before they come into operation.
On 24 April the EU went a step beyond the statement given on 4 February, signing a memorandum of understanding and an action plan with a view to concluding an ATCM. Norway remained hesitant and had not followed up the statements from the Security Conference with anything in writing.
The EU and Norway baulk at price floors
Although the EU has entered into both a memorandum of understanding on minerals cooperation and an action plan for concluding a binding minerals agreement (ATCM), it has offered the US considerable resistance on the issue. This is because the US measures for the minerals industry conflict with the EU's minerals legislation, the Critical Raw Materials Act — the price floor mechanism in particular.
The Norwegian government decided as early as March 2025 that the CRMA is to be incorporated into the EEA Agreement. In June this year, however, the Storting requested a study of a Norwegian state-owned minerals company, along with an account of the CRMA's implementation.
In July, the EU published a study confirming that the EU has no equivalent to the insolvency protection a price floor provides, and pointing to state subsidies as the solution. This is in direct conflict with the American model, which is market-financed rather than state-subsidised. This relates directly to the Morrow bankruptcy and billions (NOK) in lost state aid, because the battery plant could not compete with China on price.
Norway and Greenland are resource owners
Both Norway and Greenland are central to the minerals conflict between the EU and the US by virtue of their mineral deposits. The US is itself a resource owner, and its minerals policy reflects this. The EU, which has very limited mineral resources within its own territory, pursues a policy that reflects its position as an importer.
Ending the West's mineral dependence on China
The US wants to end the West's mineral dependence on China and replace the market with a Western minerals alliance. The EU wants to continue free trade with China, but over the course of 2026 the US has established new tariff authorities that will progressively hit both the EU and Norway if mineral agreements are not concluded.
On 6 August, President Donald Trump signed a new proclamation imposing tariffs on polysilicon and derivative products. A week later, on 13 August, he signed a corresponding proclamation on drones and drone components. In both cases the legal basis is Section 232, which gives the president authority to adjust imports when they threaten national security.
From 1 January 2027, the US military can no longer import defence materiel containing Chinese rare earth magnets, tungsten, tantalum or molybdenum. Further prohibitions of the same kind will follow.
The US introduces price floors
Pax Silica is the US initiative to end Western dependence on Chinese silicon production. Norway joined Pax Silica in May this year.
The US is following up on Pax Silica by introducing a price floor on polysilicon from 4 December this year. From that date, polysilicon can no longer be sold in the US below a set minimum price of 21 dollars per kilo, and importers falling below the minimum price must pay the difference in tariffs. On top of this comes a 15 per cent tariff on most solar products in the value chain. Norwegian wafer production will be affected on export to the US.
Since Norway has no trade agreement providing a tariff ceiling, the tariffs arising from the absence of a minerals agreement (ATCM) will come in addition to existing duties.
Because the G7, the EU and Norway are resisting the ATCM, the US is introducing the price floors unilaterally, mineral by mineral, with tariffs as the means of enforcement — as is now happening with polysilicon. This is a harder road for the US than a joint agreement, but the outcome may be the same: the proclamation opens for countries that adopt equivalent measures to have their terms adjusted. The Western minerals market is thus being built out sector by sector, regardless of whether the agreement materialises.
Price floors have also been used in individual agreements between the US and private companies. The US Department of Defense guarantees MP Materials a minimum price of 110 dollars per kilo for rare earths over ten years, in return for the state taking an ownership stake. Japan did the same with Australia's Lynas in March this year, with deliveries running to 2038.
Norway has joined FORGE
Norway has now joined FORGE, by a tortuous route. Norway had joined the Biden administration's minerals partnership, the Minerals Security Partnership (MSP), in September 2023. When FORGE was launched as the MSP's replacement in February, this met resistance — probably because the price floor (ATCM) was launched at the same time and caused confusion.
Negotiations have been under way on FORGE's guiding principles. The original text launched on 4 February has now been amended so that the commitment appears as a confirmation of an earlier commitment given to the MSP, rather than as a new commitment to FORGE. The new guiding principles were published on 10 July, and at the same time it emerged for the first time that Norway has committed to FORGE. This came in connection with South Korea handing the chairmanship of FORGE to the US on the same day the new guiding principles were made public.
The Norwegian authorities have not formally announced that Norway has "recommitted" to FORGE, but State Secretary Marte Gerhardsen at the Ministry of Defence stated at a seminar during Arendalsuka on 10 August that Norway has joined FORGE.
S&P has found an official document showing that accession to FORGE was on the agenda at the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Fisheries on 22 May this year. S&P has requested access to documents relating to FORGE and is following the case. (Updated 24.08.36: S&P was denied access to the case documents.)
Comment from Society and Politics
Through a series of articles since March 2025, S&P has followed the battle over minerals. S&P is critical of the Norwegian government's minerals policy and considers it an expression of a strategy to bring Norway into the EU. The government's objective of implementing the EU's minerals legislation, the CRMA, in the EEA Agreement will reduce Norwegian sovereignty and place Norwegian natural resources under supranational administration directed from Brussels. Read more in the Mineral Petition.
The government has not entered into a trade agreement with the US that would have provided a tariff ceiling, which further confirms the intention of bringing Norway into the EU. In doing so, the government is constructing a financial motive for EU membership, the argument being that Norway must join the EU in order to obtain equivalent tariff terms.
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SOURCES
U.S. Department of State
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European Commission
Norwegian Government (Regjeringen)
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U.S. Department of State
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Embassy of the Republic of Korea in Washington (Koreansk ambassade i Washington)
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