Join us for season four of A Rock & A Hard Place! In this first episode, I sit down with Dr. Simon Jowitt, associate professor of economic geology at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas. We look at the field of economic geology, or the scientific discipline concerned with the distribution of mineral deposits, the economic considerations involved in their recovery, and the assessment of the reserves available. Simon also discusses some of his latest work on looking at the impact of COVID-19 on the mineral supply chain and how the global pandemic and geopolitical tensions with China may change the way we think about raw materials and their supply chains.