Palladium, unwrought

Primary uses. catalytic converters; electrical contacts; hydrogen purification membranes.

The chain — from the ground to the buyer

A critical material passes through distinct stages, and the country that leads each stage is often different — that gap is what this atlas exists to show. Each layer comes from a different public source with its own vintage, labelled below; shares are % of the world total.

● Reserves — where it could come from

Reserves are the deposits known to exist and economically worth mining — the long-run ceiling on supply, distinct from what is actually produced today. Palladium's reserves are highly concentrated: 🇿🇦 South Africa holds the most (89%), ahead of 🇷🇺 Russia (8%) and 🇿🇼 Zimbabwe (2%). At today's extraction rate the known reserves would last roughly 158 years, so scarcity is not the binding constraint — access, capital and processing capacity are. Tellingly, the country sitting on the most ore (🇿🇦 South Africa) is not the one extracting it (🇷🇺 Russia) — geology sets the ceiling, but capacity and policy decide who actually supplies the market. USGS 2024 · reserves as of 2023

● Mined — where it is dug up today

Mining is where ore leaves the ground — the stage most people equate with “the source”, though it is rarely where the supply risk actually concentrates. Output is moderately concentrated: 🇷🇺 Russia supplies 44%, with 🇿🇦 South Africa (34%) next. It out-produces reserve-richer 🇿🇦 South Africa while holding just 8% of reserves itself — supply power at this stage is built on installed capacity, not geology. USGS 2024 · 2023 production

● Refined / processed — where it becomes usable metal

Refining / processing converts ore into the metal or compound buyers actually purchase; it concentrates in fewer hands than mining and sits at the buyer's doorstep, which is why it is usually the true chokepoint. 🇷🇺 Russia processes 40% — broadly diversified. Russia leads both mining and refining, so its grip is structural rather than a pure processing gate. On the buffers: 14% of supply is recovered from end-of-life recycling and substitutes are only partial, while the US imports 37% of what it consumes. leading refiner only — fuller breakdown not publicly reported

● Recycling & substitutability — the mitigants (EU CRM)

14% of supply comes from recycling end-of-life products. Substitutability is medium — partial substitutes exist.

● Traded — who ships it

Actual bilateral trade of the traded form, reconciled from UN Comtrade / CEPII BACI. Pick a year below — 2018–2024 measured, 2025* nowcast, 2026** directional scenario. The full 2002–2026 range is on the interactive atlas.

Context

Platinum's sister PGM, and the sharpest naive trap in the atlas: the member-state view says Germany ~60% (a refining/clearing hub that mines no PGM), while the true origin is South Africa ~40% and Russia ~20% - the latter a live sanctions exposure for autocatalysts.

Every figure on this page is computed from out/data.json and out/flows_2024.json by build_profiles.py — no hand-entered numbers.