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China announces new rare earth export quotas

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  • China announces new rare earth export quotas

    China announces new rare earth export quotas

    the Chinese government has announced various policies, including suspending the issuance of new licenses for rare earth prospecting and mining, imposing production caps and export quotas and announcing tougher environmental standards.

    The measures, however, have sparked complaints from major rare earth consumers such as the United States and Japan.
    I was reading about some of this stuff already happening immediately after the 3-11-11 Tsunami. Now, they are adding insult to injury whilst numerous deals involving the development of tech and optics industry making their way to China were already in the works prior to said event.

    China has been making strides towards bringing the crown jewels of the Japanese economy to their country: Autos and Optics.

    I believe that in anticipation of this, the US reopened it's mine in Mountain Pass, CA.
    "We are all special cases." - Camus

  • #2
    I have been looking to this business since it first caught my eye about six months ago. It seems that at present China has the highest production of every '-ium'. I just doubt geogicaly if they have the greatest reserves. Surely if these 'rare earth -iums' are created within the core of the planet there should not be an especialy large deposit in any particular location. I do not claim to understand the whole situation but I suggest we grab African, Australian and South American rights to look/dig/blow mountains apart etc before they aquire a monopoly status and have us by the 'short and curlies' later.

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    • #3
      Well, supposedly they found a boat load in Afghanistan.

      And in reality, they already have the world by the short and curlies. I mean 97% man, that IS a monopoly! It's matter of being able to exploit the REE's if they are found in another area, getting mines online will take years. But the way I understand the matter is that the exploration has been done, but there could surely be misses.
      "We are all special cases." - Camus

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      • #4
        The Chinese do not monopolize the world's sources of rare earth materials; however, they do monopolize their extraction. The rest of the world has plenty of known veins of rare earth elements which, ironically, is not very rare. But mining rare earth element is highly labor intensive and extremely toxic, and with the price of labor and environmental restrictions in 1st world countries they just make very poor investments. At least, that is what I read on the news.
        All those who are merciful with the cruel will come to be cruel to the merciful.
        -Talmud Kohelet Rabbah, 7:16.

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        • #5
          True...there are known deposits all over the world, but most are not concentrated enough to be economically viable. The main source of REE's (bastanite) is only found in America, Australia, and China. Australia (Lynas) is trying to finish production (and work on building their processing facility in Malayasia), while the US (Molycorp) is revamping their operation (and there is talk of government funding coming their way, considering the implications to national security, I would say that's a wise move).

          The mine shut down in 2002 because the REE's were so cheap (but the prices since 2002 are nearly 5x what they were), the prevailing theory is that is about to end. Whether or not Molycorp becomes a "major" producer, they will at the very least become a domestic stockpile of a vital material.
          "We are all special cases." - Camus

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