Tungsten (or tungsten) rods with evaporated crystals, partially oxidized
The US and Israeli conflict with Iran has drained ammunition at a staggering rate. This is putting pressure on the supply of a crucial metal for armies around the world: tungsten, or, as it is better known in Portugal, tungsten.
O tungsten it is used in armor-piercing ammunition, in components that need to withstand high levels of heat, and is an important additive in steel. Armed forces around the world they would be paralyzed without this element of strategic importance.
However, despite current demand, the amount of tungsten extracted annually is much lower than that of other oremetals, such as iron and aluminum (bauxite).
Furthermore, most of the world’s tungsten comes from Chinawhich recently imposed restrictions on the supply of this mineral.
For some countries, the urgency to secure new sources of tungsten has never been so vital, explains Gavin D. J. Harperresearcher at the University of Birmingham, in an article in .
The name of tungsten (element ⁷⁴W) comes from Swedish tung stenwhich means heavy stone. In Portugal, it is better known as wolframfrom the German wolfram. THE extreme hardness and thermal shock resistance This mineral is what makes it so coveted for military technology.
In armor-piercing munitions, dense rods of tungsten alloy use the sheer speed of their impact to tear through the armor of combat vehicles and other hardened targets.
When purified, tungsten has the highest melting point of all metals: 3.422 °C. As you would expect, it is used in components that need to withstand high temperatures, such as those found inside aircraft engines.
Tungsten, along with other metals such as molybdenumis added to steel to improve its “hot hardness”. While normal steel would deform at elevated temperatures, the addition of these other metals improves the steel’s resistance to deformation under high temperatures.
These metals form carbides with the carbon present in steel, making it more wear-resistant and resisting “creep” — the phenomenon by which steel deforms in response to constant stress at elevated temperatures.
Because tungsten and molybdenum atoms are significantly larger than iron atoms, improve the “yield stress” of steelpreventing defects in the metallic crystal lattice from spreading. Steel is used in the manufacture of much military equipment, so tungsten is vitally important.
Limited availability
That said, the global tungsten market is small, notes Harper. Tungsten is what is called “minor metal“, because it is not traded openly on exchanges like the London Metal Exchange.
This makes price data opaque. While mining operations around the world produce about 2.6 billion tons of iron ore per year, they only produce about 84,000 tons of tungsten.
Tungsten is also considered, along with tin, tantalum and golda group often known as 3TG metals, a “conflict mineral”. A significant amount is extracted in regions ravaged by violenceforced labor and human rights abuses.
Portugal was and continues to be a country with tradition in tungsten extraction. THE Panasqueira minein Beira Baixa, is one of the oldest tungsten mines in the world still in operation.
During World War II, the Portuguese tungsten has become a highly contested strategic resource: both the Allies and Nazi Germany pressured the Salazar regime to guarantee its supply, which gave rise to the so-called “tungsten race” — a period of mining fever in the north and center of Portugal that transformed entire villages.
Currently, the China produces about 80% of the world’s tungstenand does so at such low costs that it is difficult for Western companies to compete. In the US, commercial tungsten extraction ceased in 2015.
Beijing is leveraging its dominant position to control tungsten supplies through a sophisticated state trading and licensing regime.
Exports of critical derivatives are restricted to a “white list” of authorized state-owned companies, which channels a huge supply of the metal through a pipeline monitored by the government. In February 2026, China imposed export controls and reduced extraction quotas, limiting the availability of tungsten.
Beijing’s actions introduced significant friction in Western supply chains for tungsten military and aerospace applications.
Exhaustion of reserves
In the midst of the geopolitical turmoil unfolding in the Middle East, a huge appetite for tungstenwith each bomb, missile and kinetic interceptor further depleting reserves.
This puts a intractable problem for the defense industry. There was a 12% increase in the use of military tungsten only this year — in helicopters, combat aircraft and ammunition. This is difficult to accommodate in a market without availability.
A global logistics is even more complicated by the challenges to global shipping created by the war, which burdens the movement of mining equipment and materials for processing through the handful of mines outside China.
Tungsten also has a 42% recycling ratehigher than that of many other critical materials. The recycling rate is the proportion of end-of-life tungsten that is diverted from landfill and made available for reuse.
About 30 to 35% of global tungsten supply comes from scrap (i.e. the proportion of new material produced from recycled content).
In Western markets, this value is approximately doublearound 70%, due to the China’s dominance in the tungsten market. This scrap comes from both manufacturing waste and end-of-life products.
However, supply disruptions can often act as innovation catalyst.
But it could be good
In World War II, metallurgists faced a critical shortage of molybdenum. German submarine attacks on sea convoys blocked the supply of this material.
This forced metallurgists at the British engineering company Vickers to innovate and recycle molybdenum from mining drill bits.
In the past, war forced innovation to ensure the flow of critical materials — we can draw lessons from the British response to the molybdenum shortage in the Second World War.
Limited global tungsten supply continues to present significant challenges for many countries. One of the factors limiting reserves is the deterioration of ore contents from primary supplyi.e. the concentration of valuable metal in the extracted rock is decreasing over time. Another is the restrictive regime of export licensing from China.
The current situation has pushed prices to record highs and challenges the just-in-time nature of many supply chains. But it could be an opportunity to force the industry to innovate — and find new ways to extract this mineral, or find alternative materials.
