US copper tariffs are a bet against China

By Ralph Schoellhammer – UnHerd

On Tuesday, Donald Trump announced that the United States would impose a new 50% tariff on all copper imports. “Today we’re doing copper,” he declared, suggesting that the measures would extend to other commodities. And, naturally, this decision is about much more than just copper.

Copper is the lifeblood of modern infrastructure, from the electrical grid to advanced military hardware, but the AI revolution has created another major consumption category which is poised to grow over the coming decades. These are data centres, which use approximately 27 tonnes of copper per MW of power capacity, reflecting the commodity’s critical role in power distribution, cooling systems, and data transmission.