Rare earth metals at the heart of China's rivalry with U.S., Europe

14 June, 2021
Rare earth metals at the heart of China's rivalry with U.S., Europe
Imagine if China were to take off the United States and Europe from access to rare minerals that are crucial to electric vehicles, wind generators and drones?

At a time of frequent geopolitical friction among those three powers, Washington and Brussels want in order to avoid this scenario by buying the market for 17 minerals with unique properties that today are largely extracted and refined in China.

"The expected exponential growth popular for minerals that are associated with clean energy is putting more pressure on U.S. and Europe to take a closer look at where in fact the vulnerabilities are and the concrete steps these governments can take," said Jane Nakano, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies.

In 2019, the United States imported 80 percent of its rare earth minerals from China, the U.S. Geological Survey says.

EUROPE gets 98 percent of its supply from China, the European Commission said this past year.

Amid the transition to green energy in which rare earth minerals will definitely are likely involved, China's market dominance will do to sound an alarm in western capitals.

Rare earth minerals with names like neodymium, praseodymium and dysprosium are crucial to the manufacture of magnets found in industries into the future like wind turbines and electric cars. Plus they are already present in consumer goods such as smartphones, computer screens and telescopic lenses.

Others have more traditional uses, like cerium for glass polishing and lanthanum for car catalysts or optical lenses.

Last week the U.S. Senate passed a law aimed at improving American competitiveness which includes provisions to boost critical minerals supply chains, carrying out a similar executive order issued by President Joe Biden in February.

Washington aims to improve production and processing of rare earths and lithium, another key mineral component, while "dealing with allies and partners to improve sustainable global supply and reduce reliance on geopolitical competitors," Deputy Director of the National Economic Council Sameera Fazili said.

The best hope for boosting American production can be found at the Mountain Pass mine in California.

Once among the major players in the sector, the mine suffered as China rose and ate up its market share, aided by Beijing's heavy government subsidies.

MP Materials relaunched the mine in 2017 and aims to make it symbolic of America's professional rebirth, saying the concentration of rare earths at its site is among the world's greatest and highest-grade rare earth deposits, with soil concentrations of seven percent versus 0.1 to four percent elsewhere.

The company's aim is to separate rare earth minerals from the other person via a chemical process, and then by 2025 manufacture the magnets that industry uses -- as market-leading Chinese businesses currently do.

The project was supported by the U.S. government, while a Chinese firm is a minority shareholder.

Elsewhere, Australian company Lynas has won several contracts in the United States, including an ore refinery in Texas for the military that was supported by the Defense Department.

In Europe, Bernd Schafer, CEO and Managing Director of rare earth mineral consortium Eit Raw Materials, said this month an "action plan" will be presented to the European Commission how to boost production.

Europe, however, faces a far more complicated path to attaining this goal, said David Merriman, a specialist in batteries and electric cars for London-based consultancy Roskill.

"Europe is likely to rely on importing raw materials or semi-processed materials and become more a processing base or recycling base," he said.

China is expected to remain dominant for some time to come, but Schafer said that if recycling is scaled up, "20 to 30 percent of Europe's rare earth magnet needs by 2030 could be sourced domestically in the EU from literally zero today."

The desire to accelerate rare earth production comes amid a shortage of semiconductors, which are crucial for the computing and automotive industries and mostly manufactured in Asia.

The scarcity "has caused global manufacturers to take into account their supply chain in a fresh way, and think about vulnerabilities," a spokesman for MP Materials said, adding that several European automotive and wind power organizations are already in touch with the company.
Source: japantoday.com
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