Request for Public Comments on the Potential Market Impact of the Proposed Fiscal Year 2026 Annual Materials Plan From the National Defense Stockpile Market Impact Committee

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Published

August 29, 2024

Issuing agencies

Commerce DepartmentIndustry and Security Bureau

Abstract

The National Defense Stockpile Market Impact Committee, co- chaired by the Departments of Commerce and State, is seeking public comments on the potential market impact of proposed changes to the Fiscal Year (FY) 2026 Annual Materials Plan (AMP). Potential changes to the AMP are decided by the National Defense Stockpile Market Impact Committee, which advises the Defense Logistics Agency in its role as the National Defense Stockpile Manager on the projected domestic and foreign economic effects of all acquisitions, conversions, and disposals involving the National Defense Stockpile.

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<title>Federal Register, Volume 89 Issue 168 (Thursday, August 29, 2024)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 89, Number 168 (Thursday, August 29, 2024)]
[Notices]
[Pages 70166-70169]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2024-19422]

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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

Bureau of Industry and Security

[Docket No. 240816-0219]
XRIN: 0694-XC107

Request for Public Comments on the Potential Market Impact of the
Proposed Fiscal Year 2026 Annual Materials Plan From the National
Defense Stockpile Market Impact Committee

AGENCY: Bureau of Industry and Security, Department of Commerce.

ACTION: Notice of inquiry; request for comments.

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SUMMARY: The National Defense Stockpile Market Impact Committee, co-
chaired by the Departments of

[[Page 70167]]

Commerce and State, is seeking public comments on the potential market
impact of proposed changes to the Fiscal Year (FY) 2026 Annual
Materials Plan (AMP). Potential changes to the AMP are decided by the
National Defense Stockpile Market Impact Committee, which advises the
Defense Logistics Agency in its role as the National Defense Stockpile
Manager on the projected domestic and foreign economic effects of all
acquisitions, conversions, and disposals involving the National Defense
Stockpile.

DATES: To be considered, written comments must be received by
September 30, 2024.

ADDRESSES: Comments on this rule may be submitted to the Federal
rulemaking portal (<a href="http://www.regulations.gov">www.regulations.gov</a>). The <a href="http://regulations.gov">regulations.gov</a> ID for
this rule is: BIS-2024-0030. Please refer to XRIN 0694-XC107 in all
comments.
All filers using the portal should use the name of the person or
entity submitting the comments as the name of their files, in
accordance with the instructions below. Anyone submitting business
confidential information should clearly identify the business
confidential portion at the time of submission, file a statement
justifying nondisclosure and referring to the specific legal authority
claimed, and provide a non-confidential version of the submission.
For comments submitted electronically containing business
confidential information, the file name of the business confidential
version should begin with the characters ``BC.'' Any page containing
business confidential information must be clearly marked ``BUSINESS
CONFIDENTIAL'' on the top of that page. The corresponding non-
confidential version of those comments must be clearly marked
``PUBLIC.'' The file name of the non-confidential version should begin
with the character ``P.'' Any submissions with file names that do not
begin with either a ``BC'' or a ``P'' will be assumed to be public and
will be made publicly available through <a href="https://www.regulations.gov">https://www.regulations.gov</a>.
Commenters submitting business confidential information are encouraged
to scan a hard copy of the non-confidential version to create an image
of the file, rather than submitting a digital copy with redactions
applied, to avoid inadvertent redaction errors which could enable the
public to read business confidential information.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Tosca Fischer, Office of Strategic
Industries and Economic Security, Bureau of Industry and Security, U.S.
Department of Commerce, telephone: (202) 482-3528, (Attn: Tosca
Fischer), email: <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#713c3832311318025f151e125f161e07"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="a1ece8e2e1c3c8d28fc5cec28fc6ced7">[email&#160;protected]</span></a>.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

Background

The federal government operates several different stockpiles that
are managed by different federal agencies depending on the stockpile's
purpose. For example, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)
manages the Strategic National Stockpile, which contains medicines and
medical equipment. HHS' stockpile may supplement medical
countermeasures needed by states, tribal nations, territories, and the
largest metropolitan areas during public health emergencies. Another
example is the Department of Energy's operation of the Strategic
Petroleum Reserve for use in the event the international oil market is
severely disrupted.
The Department of Defense (DOD) maintains a stockpile of critical
and strategic materials known as the National Defense Stockpile (NDS).
During a war or national emergency, this stockpile is meant to provide
strategic and critical materials to support national defense and
essential civilian requirements. The stockpile currently contains 61
materials (primarily minerals) that are deemed strategic and critical
to national security.\1\
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\1\ Defense Logistics Agency, ``Strategic Materials: Office,''
U.S. Department of Defense, <a href="https://www.dla.mil/Strategic-Materials/About">https://www.dla.mil/Strategic-Materials/About</a>.
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Under the authority of the Strategic and Critical Materials Stock
Piling Revision Act of 1979, as amended (the Stock Piling Act) (50
U.S.C. 98 et seq.), the Department of Defense's Defense Logistics
Agency (DLA) is the National Defense Stockpile Manager. The NDS is a
strategic stockpile, not an economic stockpile. It is not intended to
influence prices in the market or insulate private industry from supply
shocks. Rather, its purpose is to ensure the defense and essential
civilian industrial base has consistent access to the materiel it
needs--and the private industries making products have the raw
materials they need--during a war or national emergency.
Congress authorizes the sale of excess materials from the
stockpile, and proceeds from the sales are transferred to the National
Defense Stockpile Transaction Fund. The NDS does not receive annual
appropriations in the defense budget for operational expenses. Instead,
the stockpile has a revolving fund in what the U.S. Treasury termed the
National Defense Stockpile Transaction Fund.\2\ Whenever materials in
the stockpile are sold, the proceeds from that sale are added to that
fund. The DLA then uses that money to pay for the operational expenses
accompanying the maintenance of the stockpile. Information about
stockpile disposals--what was sold and at what value it was sold--is
publicly available in monthly announcements published by the DLA.\3\
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\2\ Strategic and Critical Materials Stock Piling Revision Act
of 1979, Public Law 96-41, p. 5.
\3\ <a href="https://www.dla.mil/Strategic-Materials/Announcements/">https://www.dla.mil/Strategic-Materials/Announcements/</a>.
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Section 3314 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal
Year 1993 (FY 1993 NDAA) (50 U.S.C. 98h-1) formally established a
Market Impact Committee (the Committee) to ``advise the National
Defense Stockpile Manager on the projected domestic and foreign
economic effects of all acquisitions and disposals of materials from
the stockpile . . .'' The Committee must also balance market impact
concerns with the statutory requirement to protect the U.S. Government
against avoidable loss. See 50 U.S.C. 98e(b)(2).
The Committee is comprised of representatives from the Departments
of Commerce, State, Agriculture, Defense, Energy, Interior, the
Treasury, and Homeland Security. The FY 1993 NDAA directs the Committee
to consult with industry representatives that produce, process, or
consume the types of materials stored in the stockpile as the National
Defense Stockpile Manager. The DLA must produce an Annual Materials
Plan (AMP) proposing the maximum quantity of each listed material that
may be acquired, disposed of, upgraded, converted, recovered, or sold
by the DLA in a particular fiscal year. With this notice, Commerce, on
behalf of the DLA, lists the quantities and types of activity--
potential disposals, potential acquisitions, potential conversions
(upgrade, rotation, reprocessing, etc.) or potential recovery (from
government sources) --associated with each material in its proposed FY
2026 AMP.
The quantities listed in Attachment 1 are not acquisition,
disposal, upgrade, conversion, recovery, reprocessing, or sales target
quantities, but rather a statement of the proposed maximum quantity of
each listed material that may be acquired, disposed of, upgraded,
converted, recovered, or sold in a particular fiscal year by the DLA.
The quantity of each material that will actually be acquired or offered
for sale will depend on the market for the material at the time of the
acquisition or offering, as well as on the quantity of

[[Page 70168]]

each material approved by Congress for acquisition, disposal,
conversion, or recovery.

Additional Instructions for Comments

The Committee is interested in any supporting data and
documentation on the potential market impact of the quantities
associated with the proposed FY 2026 AMP.
While <a href="http://regulations.gov">regulations.gov</a> allows users to provide comments by filling
in a ``Type Comment'' field or by attaching a document using an
``Upload File'' field, BIS prefers comments be provided in an attached
document--preferably in Microsoft Word (.doc) or Adobe Acrobat (.pdf).
If the submission is in an application format other than Microsoft Word
or Adobe Acrobat, please indicate the name of the application in the
``Type Comment'' field. Please do not attach separate cover letters to
electronic submissions; rather, include any information that might
appear in a cover letter within the comments. Please include any
exhibits, annexes, or other attachments in the same file, so the
submission consists of one instead of multiple files. All filers should
name their files using the name of the person or entity submitting the
comments.
Submitted materials properly marked as business confidential
information with a valid statutory basis for confidentiality, and which
is accepted as such by BIS, will not be publicly disclosed. Commenters
submitting business confidential information should clearly identify
the business confidential portion at the time of submission, include a
statement justifying nondisclosure and referring to the specific legal
authority claimed with the submission, and provide a non-confidential
version of the submission which will be placed in the public file on
<a href="https://www.regulations.gov">https://www.regulations.gov</a>. For comments containing business
confidential information, the file name of the business confidential
version should begin with the characters ``BC''. Any page containing
business confidential information must be clearly marked ``BUSINESS
CONFIDENTIAL'' at the top of that page. The file name of the non-
confidential version should begin with the character ``P''. The non-
confidential version must be clearly marked ``PUBLIC'' at the top of
the first page. The ``BC'' and ``P'' should be followed by the name of
the person or entity submitting the comments. Commenters submitting
business confidential information are encouraged to scan a hard copy of
the non-confidential version to create an image of the file, rather
than submitting a digital copy with redactions applied, to avoid
inadvertent redaction errors which could enable the public to read
business confidential information.
Public comments will be available on <a href="http://regulations.gov">regulations.gov</a>, and the BIS
Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) website at <a href="https://efoia.bis.doc.gov/">https://efoia.bis.doc.gov/</a>. This office does not maintain a separate public
inspection facility. If you have technical difficulties accessing this
website, please call BIS's Office of Administration at (202) 482-1900
for assistance.

Attachment 1

Proposed Fiscal Year 2026 Annual Materials Plan
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Material Unit Quantity Footnote
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Potenial Disposals
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Beryllium Metal................................ ST............................... 8 ............
Carbon Fibers.................................. Lbs.............................. 92,000 (\1\)
Chromium, Ferro................................ ST............................... 24,000 ............
Chromium, Metal................................ ST............................... 500 ............
Germanium...................................... kg............................... 5,000 ............
Manganese, Ferro............................... ST............................... 20,000 ............
Manganese, Metallurgical Grade................. SDT.............................. 320,300 (\1\)
Aerospace Alloys............................... Lbs.............................. 1,500,000 ............
Platinum....................................... Tr Oz............................ 8,380 (\1\)
Iridium........................................ Tr Oz............................ 489 (\1\)
Quartz Crystals................................ Lbs.............................. 15,712 (\1\)
Tantalum....................................... Lbs.............................. 190 (\1\)
Tin............................................ MT............................... 640 ............
Titanium Based Alloys.......................... Lbs.............................. 300,000 ............
Tungsten Ores & Concentrates................... Lbs W............................ 1,100,000 ............
Zinc........................................... ST............................... 2,500 ............
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Potenial Acquisitions
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Aluminum (High Purity)......................... MT............................... 1,700 ............
Aluminum Alloys................................ MT............................... 1,500 ............
Antimony....................................... MT............................... 700 ............
Cadmium Zinc Tellurium......................... CM \2\........................... 2,800 ............
Electrolytic Manganese Metal................... MT............................... 5,000 ............
Energetics..................................... Lbs.............................. 20,000,000 ............
Ferroniobium................................... Lbs Nb........................... 300,000 ............
Grain Oriented Electric Steel.................. MT............................... 3,200 ............
Iso-Molded Graphite............................ MT............................... 1,700 ............
Lanthanum...................................... MT............................... 1,100 ............
Magnesium...................................... MT............................... 3,500 ............
Neodymium-Praseodymium Oxide................... MT............................... 300 ............
NdFeB Magnet Block............................. MT............................... 450 ............
Samarium-Cobalt Alloy.......................... MT............................... 60 ............
Tantalum....................................... Lbs Ta........................... 64,500 ............
Tire Cord Steel................................ MT............................... 130 ............
Titanium....................................... MT............................... 13,608 ............
Tungsten....................................... Lbs W............................ 587,000 ............

[[Page 70169]]

Zirconium-Hafnium.............................. MT............................... 2,300 ............
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Potential Conversions (Upgrade, rotation, reprocessing, etc.)
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Aerospace Alloys............................... Lbs.............................. 50,000 ............
Antimony....................................... Lbs.............................. 198,000 ............
Beryllium Metal................................ ST............................... 8 ............
Boron Carbide.................................. MT............................... 600 ............
Cadmium Zinc Tellurium......................... CM \2\........................... 1,000 ............
Carbon Fibers.................................. Lbs.............................. 5,000 ............
Europium....................................... MT............................... 35 ............
Germanium...................................... kg............................... 5,000 ............
Iridium Catalyst............................... Lbs.............................. 200 ............
Iso-Molded Graphite............................ MT............................... 1,700 ............
Lithium Ion Materials.......................... MT............................... 50 ............
Rare Earths Elements........................... MT............................... 12 ............
Silicon Carbide Fibers......................... Lbs.............................. 875 ............
SEG Concentrate................................ MT............................... 13 ............
Triamino Trinitrobenzene (TATB)................ Lbs.............................. 48,000 ............
Tungsten-Rhenium............................... kg............................... 5,000 ............
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Potential Recovery from Government sources
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Aerospace Alloys............................... Lbs.............................. 1,500,000 ............
Battery Materials.............................. MT............................... 1,500 ............
Boron Carbide.................................. MT............................... 300 ............
Cobalt......................................... MT............................... 500 ............
E-Waste........................................ MT............................... 100 (\2\)
Germanium...................................... kg............................... 5,000 ............
Iridium Catalyst............................... Lbs.............................. 200 ............
Magnesium Metal................................ MT............................... 25 ............
Rare Earths.................................... Lbs.............................. 51,000 ............
Tantalum....................................... MT............................... 10 ............
Yttrium Aluminum Garnet Rods................... kg............................... 250 ............
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Footnote Key:
\1\ Actual quantity will be limited to remaining excess inventory.
\2\ Strategic and Critical Materials collected from E-Waste (Strategic Materials collected from electronics
waste).

Thea D. Rozman Kendler,
Assistant Secretary for Export Administration.
[FR Doc. 2024-19422 Filed 8-28-24; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-33-P

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