U.S. puts $2 billion into critical materials for its defense stockpile

The Defense Logistics Agency committed $2 billion during fiscal year 2026 to buy strategic and critical materials for the National Defense Stockpile, the U.S. government’s reserve of raw materials held for national emergencies, the agency said on November 6.

The fiscal year ran from October 2025 through September 2026.

DLA did not publish a list of the materials, suppliers or quantities behind the figure, and it did not say how much of the $2 billion has already been paid out rather than committed under longer-term contracts. Eric Mata, director of DLA Strategic Materials, said most of the critical mineral contracts awarded through the agency’s Contracting Services Office were designed as targeted demand signals, meaning purchases intended to give domestic producers enough guaranteed business to start or expand production.

“Domestic sourcing is especially important when a material is essential to national defense, is subject to concentrated or vulnerable supply chains, is difficult to replace, and is not readily available from reliable sources in the quantities or forms required,” Mata said.

The stockpile holds materials needed for military, industrial and essential civilian use during a national emergency that cannot be bought commercially in sufficient quantities. Photos released with the announcement show about 35,000 metric tons of tin stored in a warehouse in Hammond, Indiana, a pile of ferromanganese at Point Pleasant, West Virginia, and germanium ingots. DLA said its purchases range from high-purity aluminum to vanadium pentoxide, and that the material can come from recycling, recovery, refining and processing as well as mining. The reserve is not a ready supply for industry, since a DLA spokesperson told the Nevada Current last year that stockpiled material can be released only in a declared war or by order of the Under Secretary of War.

Congress expanded the stockpile’s budget sharply in July 2025, when the One Big Beautiful Bill Act appropriated $2 billion to the National Defense Stockpile Transaction Fund, the account used to buy stockpile material. Before that law passed, the fund held a little more than $958 million. The same legislation set aside $5 billion for the Industrial Base Fund to support critical mineral supply chains. DLA’s announcement does not say whether its fiscal 2026 commitments were paid for from the new appropriation.

The largest stockpile award disclosed during the fiscal year went to Elmet Technologies, which in September received a contract to supply tungsten ores, concentrates and sodium tungstate through August 2031. The deal is an indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity contract, a framework under which the agency places orders over time, so its $2 billion figure is a spending ceiling and only $150 million is guaranteed. The Department of War separately committed $450 million to Elmet’s parent company to expand domestic tungsten production, and on September 30 DLA awarded Elmet a further contract worth about $36 million for molybdenum and tungsten alloys and wire. DLA has not said how these awards are counted within its $2 billion total.

Earlier stockpile purchases followed the same pattern. In September 2025, the agency awarded United States Antimony Corp. a contract worth up to $245 million for antimony metal ingots, and the Financial Times reported at the time that DLA planned to buy up to $1 billion in critical minerals, including cobalt, tantalum and scandium.

“These materials support a range of industrial capabilities across aerospace, maritime, ground, space, communications and munitions-related sectors,” Mata said.

The agency has faced questions about how well it can plan these purchases. A 2024 Government Accountability Office report found that the Pentagon lacked the data it needed to project shortfalls for nearly half of the materials considered critical to national security.