Rare earth metals are plentiful pretty much everywhere, but the mining and refinement cause very bad pollution problems... that is why the supply was offshored in the first place. Nobody wants to cause that kind of pollution problem in their own countries.
China didn't care, but are starting to - which is why Congo is now on deck.
“ China is the world's dominant producer of rare earth elements with more than 95% of production. Only one rare earth mine, at Mountain Pass, CA, has ever been developed in the United States. The cost of putting together a REE mine can cost up to a half a billion dollars or more.”
China's costs are less, because when they decided to corner the market for rare earth minerals decades ago they did not care about the consequences of the pollution. Mitigating the pollution is one of the big reasons why it costs so much to mine and refine rare earths.
The rare earth minerals themselves are fairly common, and could be produced in many locations if countries wanted to do so. China was able to corner the market rather easily because nobody else wanted to deal with all of the problems.
Things are obviously different now, and the US must mine and refine its own ASAP - for national security if no other reason...
we have enough under the bundy ranch. or did obama already give them that?
Rare earth metals are plentiful pretty much everywhere, but the mining and refinement cause very bad pollution problems... that is why the supply was offshored in the first place. Nobody wants to cause that kind of pollution problem in their own countries.
China didn't care, but are starting to - which is why Congo is now on deck.
“ China is the world's dominant producer of rare earth elements with more than 95% of production. Only one rare earth mine, at Mountain Pass, CA, has ever been developed in the United States. The cost of putting together a REE mine can cost up to a half a billion dollars or more.”
Half a billion dollars is a big number... unless you’re the pentagon.
China's costs are less, because when they decided to corner the market for rare earth minerals decades ago they did not care about the consequences of the pollution. Mitigating the pollution is one of the big reasons why it costs so much to mine and refine rare earths.
The rare earth minerals themselves are fairly common, and could be produced in many locations if countries wanted to do so. China was able to corner the market rather easily because nobody else wanted to deal with all of the problems.
Things are obviously different now, and the US must mine and refine its own ASAP - for national security if no other reason...