reduce its reliance on fossil fuels.

[keannu]

Source : 2020 Korean College Entrance Exam, 33

The future of our high-tech goods may lie not in the limitations of our minds, but in our ability to secure the ingredients to produce them. In previous eras, such as the Iron Age and the Bronze Age, the discovery of new elements brought forth seemingly unending numbers of new inventions. Now the combinations may truly be unending. We are now witnessing a fundamental shift in our resource demands.

At no point in human history have we used more elements, in more combinations, and in increasingly refined amounts.
Our ingenuity will soon outpace our material supplies. This situation comes at a defining moment when the world is struggling to reduce its reliance on fossil fuels.

Fortunately, rare metals are key ingredients in green technologies such as electric cars, wind turbines, and solar panels. They help to convert free natural resources like the sun and wind into the power that fuels our lives. But without increasing today’s limited supplies, we have no chance of developing the alternative green technologies we need to slow climate change
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The two underlined parts are hard to understand.
1. First underlined - Does it mean future inventions will rely on materials other than fossil fuels? Then, how is it related to increasing supplies
2. Second underlined - What does "they" in the second sentence mean? Is it "rare metals"? I don't understand the theme of the last paragraph.

 

[jutfrank]

1. Yes. The idea is about increasing demand, not supplies. We need more and more of these metals, but the supply is unlikely to keep up with our demand for them.

2. It refers to rare metals, yes.