Mining companies are increasingly prioritizing the expansion of existing operations over the development of new sites, a strategic shift driven by the urgent demand for critical minerals and the complexities of establishing greenfield projects. This trend, detailed in a study published on January 22, 2026, in the journal One Earth, highlights a growing concentration of mining activities in high-risk regions and poses challenges for existing regulatory frameworks.
Research reveals that capital investment is predominantly flowing into “brownfield” projects—expansions of established mining facilities—rather than “greenfield” projects, which involve opening entirely new locations. This strategic shift is driven by the pressing global demand for minerals essential for the energy transition and the inherent difficulties and lengthy timelines associated with developing new mines. The research identified 366 brownfield sites worldwide where extraction activities are intensifying. These expansions reach deeper into deposits and extend operational timelines, concentrating mining activities in regions already facing significant environmental and social challenges.
The preference for brownfield expansion stems from practical and economic considerations. Developing new mining projects typically requires 15 years or longer to navigate permitting processes and establish necessary infrastructure. Brownfield expansions can proceed more rapidly due to the pre-existing operational framework. These expansions often face less stringent regulatory scrutiny regarding potential long-term cumulative environmental and social impacts compared to approval processes for new projects. This accelerated pathway allows companies to respond more quickly to market demands, particularly for minerals crucial to the global energy transition, such as copper, cobalt, and lithium. Projections indicate that demand for these critical minerals could increase sixfold by 2040, placing significant pressure on existing mining infrastructure to bridge anticipated supply gaps.
The acceleration of brownfield mining is intrinsically linked to global energy transition requirements. The worldwide shift toward clean energy infrastructure has created substantial demand for specific minerals. According to findings from EY’s 2026 Top of Risk and Opportunities report, operational complexity has emerged as the primary business risk facing the sector. Declining ore grades and aging mining assets make maintaining consistent production increasingly challenging. Consequently, mining companies are strategically intensifying output from already-permitted brownfield sites to manage their weighted average cost of capital, which remains substantially higher than comparable industrial sectors.
The geographic distribution of the 366 identified brownfield sites presents concerning patterns. Approximately 80 percent of these operations are located in regions characterized by high-risk conditions, including water scarcity, weak governance structures, and limited press freedom. More than one-third of these operations are situated in countries currently experiencing conflict or militarization. This concentration of mining expansion in vulnerable regions is compounded by structural inequality, as many host nations lack the regulatory capacity to effectively enforce oversight as operational risks accumulate across decades of continuous mining activity. This situation creates long-term environmental and social liabilities that are frequently treated as routine operational matters rather than requiring comprehensive strategic assessment.
Current mining policies globally remain primarily oriented toward approving new projects. However, the substantial shift toward intensifying existing operations creates long-term consequences that existing regulatory frameworks were not designed to address comprehensively. Researchers emphasize that as mining operations expand in scale and depth, regulatory systems must evolve to properly evaluate cumulative and long-term effects across multiple decades of operation. An additional complication involves technological advancement. Modern underground mining technologies make certain expansions increasingly difficult to monitor through conventional satellite imagery. This monitoring limitation suggests that the actual scope of global industrial mining expansion may be significantly underrepresented in available international data.
The EY report identifies resource and reserve depletion as a top-five industry challenge, noting that the mining sector faces the unprecedented task of producing more mineral ore in the next three decades than has been extracted throughout the previous 7,000 years of human history. The industry’s response—intensifying brownfield operations—represents a pragmatic but potentially problematic solution. It concentrates risk in vulnerable regions while potentially circumventing comprehensive regulatory oversight designed for new project development. Mexico Business News reports that this trend of prioritizing brownfield expansion over new mine development was highlighted in a study published on January 22, 2026, in the journal One Earth mining companies prioritize expanding existing sites over opening new ones.
Sources
- https://mexicobusiness.news/mining/news/brownfield-expansion-overtakes-new-mine-development-study
