The investment could be spread over more than one year, but the sources declined to comment on the time frame.
Canada last month announced financial support for building two facilities that will make battery materials for electric vehicles, and one battery gigafactory, but no agreements have yet been announced for mineral extraction or refining.
“There are some particular projects that we are looking at and working on at the present time,” Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson said in a recent telephone interview with Reuters.
All the potential projects, “whether they’re extraction or processing, need to be accelerated significantly, and that’s what the critical mineral strategy will be about,” he added.
Canada’s finance ministry declined to confirm whether the investment would be in the budget that will be presented by Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland in the House of Commons.
“Canada has an abundance of…


