AI data-centre buildout pushes copper toward shortages, analysts warn — only 70% of 2035 demand could be met, 2025 deficit thought to be 304,000 tonnes

Copper smelting.

Copper producers and market analysts are starting to outline a supply gap that arrives just as hyperscale AI campuses ramp toward record power draws. The International Energy Agency’s latest critical minerals outlook places copper on a path where existing and planned mines meet only about 70% of projected 2035 demand.

Wood Mackenzie expects shortages to appear far earlier, with a 304,000-tonne refined-copper deficit forecast for 2025 and a wider gap in 2026. That trajectory converges with a wave of AI-driven electrical infrastructure, turning a long-standing industrial metal into a practical bottleneck for data-centre expansion. According to Wood Mackenzie, Charles Cooper, speaking to the Financial Times, the “hyperscalers” building data centers are “outbidding grid suppliers on things like transformer units,” piling significant pressure on producers.