According to Nikkei, as part of the new restrictions, which will be in place until the end of October of 2025, the commerce department has added rare earths, including compounds and alloys to its “list of mineral resources and other items requiring disclosure of information such as material type and export destinations.”

The move ties into an overall context of export controls are gaining in popularity as the global race for resources heats up. India joined the ranks of countries considering export restrictions this August, and Kenya made similar headlines in October.  Zimbabwe banned lithium ore exports last December, and Namibia recently banned the export of unprocessed lithium and other critical minerals.

All these announcement tie into a larger trend, which has been noticeable particularly in Latin America, a region with a historic penchant for nationalism, but also elsewhere. ARPN has featured recent nationalist moves in Chile, Mexico and Bolivia, as well as in Myanmar, Indonesia, and China, and has showcased that even in the Western world, government involvement in the critical minerals sector is on the rise.

Of course, in light of Beijing’s dominating role in critical mineral supply chains and the current state of global affairs, China’s announcements relating to critical mineral export restrictions are not only highly consequential for U.S. domestic industry stakeholders, but must also be viewed through the prism of geopolitics, and as such U.S. national and economic security.

As Nikkei outlines, the U.S. has in recent years worked with Western allies to tighten exports of top-end semiconductors and chipmaking equipment to China, prompting Beijing to respond by considering banning “exports of manufacturing technology for high-performance magnets and other products that use rare earths” at the end of 2022.

Earlier this summer, China announced export restrictions on gallium and germanium, followed by controls on certain drones and drone-related equipment.  On October 20th, Beijing tightened the export control ratchet further – this time by announcing that to protect national security, the country require export permits for certain graphite products – a move analysts see as a play “to control supplies of critical minerals in response to challenges over its global manufacturing dominance.”

From a functional perspective, Chinese restrictions now extend to three of the key tech building blocs of the 21^st century:

-       Semiconductors (gallium/germanium)

-       Lithium-ion battery technology (graphite)

-       Permanent magnets (REEs)

As geopolitical tensions soar, this may not be the end of it. As ARPN stated before:

“As China ratchets up its export control regime (…) U.S. stakeholders would be well-advised to kick their efforts to bolster U.S. critical mineral supply chains into high gear.   For China – a ‘country of concern’ as per an August 9, 2023 Executive Order - it may be a short step from export controls to export embargoes.”

The post Gallium, Germanium, Graphite… and Now REEs – China Further Tightens Critical Mineral Export Restriction Ratchet appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

Concerns over China’s dominance over a large majority of the key critical mineral value chains has spurred efforts to decouple supply chains from China all over the globe.

Followers of ARPN are aware of U.S. efforts which include the invocation of the Defense Production Act for several critical minerals, the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act and partnership agreements with key allies as well as public-private partnership to bolster domestic critical mineral supply chains.

In Europe, the January 2023 announcement of the discovery of one of the largest rare earth elements (REE) deposits in Europe in the Kiruna mine located Sweden’s Lapland region was hailed by some as the advent of a new dawn for European resource policy, and European Union stakeholders hope that the recently released Critical Raw Materials Act, if passed, will jump start the reshoring process and “de-risk” the regional bloc’s reliance on China by streamlining the permitting process for raw materials projects and allow for selected “Strategic Projects” to benefit from support for access to financing and shorter permitting timelines.

However, as Luke Patey outlines in a piece on the European REE supply chain push for the China-focused online magazine The Wire, the process of “decoupling” is fraught with more significant real-world challenges than some would have thought considering the complexity of critical mineral supply chains, and especially REE supply chains.

For all the upbeat coverage of the Kiruna mine’s new deposit, Patey points to observers in the industry who are more cautious noting that China has “invested tens, if not, hundreds of billions of dollars in research and production to build up its industry over many years,” and cautioning that finding the REE deposits is “just step one.”

As he writes, “[t]he EU now faces the meticulous task of ticking off all nodes of the supply chain to turn its green aspirations into an industrial reality” – from mine to manufacturing – and the midstream steps of building out processing capacity, metallization and magnet making are all “steps that the EU is sorely lacking in.”

A visual of the geographical concentration of the REE permanent magnets value chain and final applications developed by the Center for European Policy Studies (CEPS) and modified by The Wire tells the story of China’s dominance:

Ultimately, Patey says:

“Reshoring, in other words, is more than just reclaiming the anchor of the supply chain. For Europe — and the U.S. — to succeed in their new critical mineral ambitions, they will need to build out links far beyond the mine.” 

He adds that while these efforts are underway “[t]he elephant in the room is that, even if they all succeed, doing all these steps on European soil does not automatically make them competitive with Chinese suppliers — both on price and on tech know-how.”

Meanwhile, efforts to build mine to manufacturing supply chains for critical minerals, and especially REEs, continue to run into the “not in my backyard” challenge — an issue that continues to permeate policy discussions on this side of the Atlantic as well. As Patey phrases it, “the rare earths supply chain blends together not only challenges of national security and industrial competitiveness, but also economic and ecological welfare,” and while the newly released Critical Raw Materials Act intends to address these challenges, critical mineral extraction still faces local resistance in many parts of the regional bloc.

It is a daunting challenge; however, it is one that stakeholders – here, across the Atlantic, or elsewhere – have to tackle comprehensively and swiftly.  China has already demonstrated its willingness to play politics with its resource leverage – and, as ARPN recently outlined, is gearing up to do it again as the weaponization of trade is back on the menu in U.S.-Chinese relations.

The post The Pitfalls of Decoupling – A Look at Europe’s REE Supply Chain Push appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

Quite obviously, much of the media attention is focused around President Vladimir Putin’s declaration that Russia has approved a vaccine for the coronavirus (after less than two months of testing) — but developments in the critical minerals realm also warrant attention:

A top Russian government official has told Reuters that Russia plans an investment of $1.5 billion in rare earth minerals in its quest to become the biggest REE producer after China by 2030.

The move comes at a time when other countries, including the United States, are trying to curb their over-reliance on foreign critical minerals against the backdrop of growing tensions with China, which has long held the pole position in the race to control the global REE supply chain.

According to Reuters, Russia is looking to attract investors for eleven projects designed to increase the country’s share of global REE output to 10% by 2030, allowing for Russia to “become almost self-sufficient in rare earth elements by 2025 and start exports in 2026.”

While it appeared that U.S. efforts to promote domestic critical mineral resource development were finally gaining traction in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic having laid bare our mineral resource supply chain challenges and over-reliance on foreign (and especially Chinese) supplies, policy may once more become the victim of politics in this watershed election year. 

Reform-minded lawmakers have put forth several legislative initiatives, and have even formed a bipartisan “Critical Materials Caucus.”  However, while critical minerals provisions were added to the latest round of COVID relief stimulus packages, chances of their passage have been dwindling as partisan tensions continue to flare.
As attempts to keep the momentum for resource-related policy reform appear to have come to an impasse in Congress, researchers are forging ahead to provide innovative solutions that not only transform the way we use certain metals and minerals, but have the potential to help alleviate our over-reliance issues. 

The Department of Energy has stepped up its efforts to promote collaboration between its research hubs and the private sector to look for ways to diversify mineral resource supply, develop substitutes and drive recycling of critical minerals and rare earth elements. Some recent initiatives include “using a high-speed shredder that turns old computer hard drives into scrap containing significant amounts of REE content,” and “recovering nickel, cobalt and manganese from disassembled electric vehicle battery packs.”

Meanwhile, in the private sector, a rare earths pilot plant processing facility situated in Wheat Ridge, Colorado, which will focus on group separation on REEs in to heavy, middle, and light rare earths, has received the required permits and officially opened. According to media reports, “USA Rare Earth’s pilot plant is the second link in a 100% US-based rare earth oxide supply chain, drawing on feedstock from its Round Top deposit.”

Even before the coronavirus pandemic hit,  the U.S. had begun to enter into cooperative agreements with allied nations to ensure future supplies of critical materials, specifically with Canada and Australia. 

Against the backdrop of the upcoming 2020 elections, finding policy consensus may be more than an uphill battle.  However, for the sake of our national security and economic wellbeing, lawmakers would be well-advised to reach out across the political aisle to foster a policy environment that promotes an all-of-the-above approach on critical minerals and harnesses the United States’ vast domestic mineral potential.   

The post Russia Pushes for Global Rare Earth Market Share as U.S. Struggles to Move Forward With Critical Minerals Initiatives appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

The Tech Wars Heat Up: U.S. Makes National Security Declarations to Spur Rare Earths Development

Forget the trade war – the tech war is heating up.  After weeks of Chinese threats that it could cut off U.S. access to the essential technology materials known as rare earths, the Trump Administration today took a counter-action of its own.

Jennifer Dlouhy has the story at Bloomberg News:  “Trump invoked the 69-year-old Defense Production Act — once used to preserve American steelmaking capacity — to remedy what he called ‘a shortfall’ in production of the super-strong magnets made with rare-earth minerals neodymium and samarium.”  In fact, the White House published five separate Title III declarations, carefully identifying each category of rare earths plus the powerful permanent magnets — and the smart bombs and precision-guided munitions — they make possible.

The Defense Production Act dates to the early months after North Korea’s invasion of South Korea in 1950.  Title III of the act requires the specific finding made today by the president:

“domestic production capability for separation and processing of Heavy Rare Earth Elements is essential to the national defense.

Without Presidential action…, United States industry cannot reasonably be expected to provide the production capability for separation and processing of Heavy Rare Earth Elements adequately and in a timely manner.”

How will China respond to the new U.S. action?  And how quickly can the U.S. close the rare earths gap — with production today at zero, even as known U.S. rare earth resources exist — before China loses its leverage over materials the U.S. Government has deemed critical to “the national economy and national security?”

The post McGroarty: Tech Wars Heat Up – Administration Invokes Defense Production Act to Spur Domestic REE Development appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

On the show, McGroarty makes clear that we have entered a new dimension of warfare:

“There was never a time in which the United States was equipping its military with materials that were being sold to us by the Soviets. (…) This is a very unusual situation we’re in with China. (…) These are the metals and minerals of the 21st Century. These are the tech metals that we need as a society. (..) The trade war… we might solve that. But underneath the trade war, there’s a tech war going on, and I don’t think we’ve even begun to realize that.”

Originally aired on 6-23-19, the segment of the Tim Jones Show is available via podcast here.

The post Podcast: ARPN’s Dan McGroarty Discusses U.S.-Chinese Trade Tensions Over REEs appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

According to the Global Times’s twitter feed, U.S. military equipment firms will likely face restrictions of Chinese Rare Earth supplies in the near future, as China’s economic planners will “study and roll out policies on rare earths as soon as possible.”    

The Global Times is an English language newspaper published by the Communist Party of China’s publication People’s Daily.

As followers of ARPN well know, China has a near-total supply monopoly on rare earths, which are key components of a wide range of applications ranging from household gadgets over hi-tech military equipment to renewable energy technology. 

In recent months, trade tensions between the United States and China have deepened leading observers to sound the alarm, because the lack of domestic REE sources has created a serious strategy vulnerability vis-à-vis our adversaries, as underscored by the 2010 decision by China to cut of REE exports to Japan. 

While some observers dismiss the looming threat of a Chinese REE supply embargo and cite a diversification of sources over the course of the past decade – including the Mountain Pass mine in California – which have reduced China’s supply monopoly to 77 percent, ARPN expert panel member and president and founder of public affairs firm J.A. Green & Company, points out via Twitter that 

“Citing the decrease to 71% Chinese production ignores other parts of the supply chain. We should break down reliance on China for #REE metal, alloy and magnets to be a useful statistic.”

He further cautions that “[t]o rely on ‘market forces’ to take care of the issue is dangerously naïve from a national security perspective. This is not a case of free trade, but rather Chinese market manipulation (as validated by the WTO ruling).”

Green concludes:

“Mountain Pass is a valuable resource, but is not a comprehensive solution. It is still reliant on the Chinese, it does not move past the concentrate phase of the supply chain, and is lacking in heavy REEs.”

Thankfully, there are indications that our policy makers appear to awaken to the seriousness of the situation, and the just-released critical minerals strategy report by the U.S. Department of Commerce acknowledges that “If China or Russia were to stop exports to the United States and its allies for a prolonged period — similar to China’s rare earths embargo in 2010 — an extended supply disruption could cause significant shocks throughout U.S. and foreign critical mineral supply chains.”

The post Global Times: REE Supply Restrictions Likely for U.S. Military Equipment Firms appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

Bastasch cites ARPN’s Dan McGroarty, who says that “China is letting the U.S. know that it has leverage.”

Followers of ARPN will remember that China is no stranger to playing politics with its near-total rare earth supply monopoly.

McGroarty hopes that these threats could in fact serve as a catalyst for Congressional and/or executive actions to reduce our nation’s over-reliance on foreign mineral imports – because the issue is, to a large extent, a self-inflicted problem. 

Says McGroarty:

“The irony, and that is an understatement, is that the U.S. has rare earth deposits capable of meeting national security needs, and ending the reliance on China. With China saber-rattling on the rare earths, this could be the time for a strong U.S. response.”

The post ARPN’s McGroarty Quoted in Daily Caller Piece on the Specter of China Playing the “Rare Earths Card” appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

Nonetheless, one provision of the signed legislation marks an important development for the realm of resource policy – so important, in fact, that Jeffery A. Green, president and founder of J. A. Green & Company and member of the ARPN panel of experts calls it “the single biggest legislative development in the rare earth sector since the 2010 Chinese embargo created an awareness of our military’s reliance on foreign rare earth materials.”

The NDAA’s Section 873, “Prohibition on acquisition of sensitive materials from non-allied foreign nations,” amends Subchapter V of chapter 148 of title 10, U.S. Code by inserting section 2533c – which, among other things, effectively prevents the Pentagon from sourcing of Rare Earth Magnets from China.

In response to questions from InvestorIntel, Green provides some more context:

“The new law which sets an increased budget for defense expenditure prevents the purchase of rare earth magnets from China, which currently produces 85-90% per cent of the world’s rare earth magnets. Some 90% of rare earths consumed by the US military are produced by China.

The new law takes effect immediately, but practically speaking, it will take the DoD some time to implement the law through regulation and to start including the prohibition in new contracts.

To be clear, this law only applies to the use of Chinese NdFeB (Neodymium, Iron, Boron) and SmCo (Samarium, Cobalt) magnets, the latter being already subject to a previous law requiring domestic sourcing.

The new law, 10 U.S.C. 2533c, closely mirrors an existing domestic sourcing law, ‘the specialty metals clause’, at 10 U.S.C. 2533b.  While the latter is a Buy American clause, the former states DOD will not allow rare earth magnets and tungsten in weapon systems that is produced by potential adversaries.

The law explicitly prohibits rare earth magnets and tungsten from being ‘melted or produced’ in China, Russia, North Korea and Iran. That means the production of the magnet can’t be in those countries, so importers and distributors can’t simply bring magnet block into another country and finish into a final part – the law is designed to reinvigorate rare earth magnet manufacturing outside of China.”

As Green had previously stated in a piece for Real Clear Defense as the bill was being considered by lawmakers:

“While a good first step, and one long overdue, Sec. 873 addresses just a small percentage of America’s import dependence for essential military components. In next year’s NDAA, Congress should consider expanding this provision, with input from the technical experts at the Department of Defense, to include other critical minerals essential to national security.”

With the precedent-setting passage of the amendment, the groundwork has been laid for this to actually happen. Writes Green:

“The DOD may ask in the near future for new materials to be added to 10 U.S.C. 2533c, so there’s a good chance that this precedent continues as the Trump Administration seeks to eliminate the strategic vulnerability of foreign import reliance for critical materials – this bodes well for prospective producers outside China and Russia.”

Read the full InvestorIntel piece here.

The post While Some Reforms Fizzled, Enacted NDAA Contains Potentially Precedent-Setting REE Sourcing Provision appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

Meanwhile, in the real world, as part of our feature series “Materials Science Profiles of Progress,” we’re taking a closer look at a recently-announced research partnership that may not be able to turn straw into gold, but promises to extract precious Rare Earth Elements from coal.

A new Department of Energy grant-funded program bringing together a consortium of research entities and private companies including Penn State University, Texas Minerals Resources Corp., Inventure Renewables, and K Technologies seeks to evaluate ways to extract Rare Earth Elements from coal overburden, the material that sits atop a coal seam, provided by Pennsylvania-based Jeddo Coal Co.

According to the Republican Herald, “[t]he processing method is being developed in conjunction with Penn State and relies on continuous ion exchange and ion chromatography — which is believed to be cleaner and more efficient than the solvent exchange method that is presently used for processing rare earth elements.”

While touring Jeddo Coal Co.’s mining facilities near Stockton Mountain in Pennsylvania, which are currently idling but are set to become the site of operation for the consortium, Energy Secretary Rick Perry touted the program which he considered “staggeringly important” and the role it could play in reducing our nation’s over-reliance on foreign imports of REE materials used in high-tech 21st Century applications:

“I don’t think we can overstate how important the development of rare earth minerals out of our anthracite coal is, and the potential that it’s going to have. (…) I think it’s a really important message coming from this administration that whether it’s rare minerals, whether it’s that load of coal that’s headed to Ukraine, the future is bright. (…) We’re going to find the ways to use this natural resource that we have to the betterment not just to America, but to our allies as well.”

Perry was joined by Rep. Lou Barletta (R, PA-11), who was one of the earliest congressional backers of the program. Barletta argued at the time of the grant announcement:

“The Department of Energy’s studies have shown that the Appalachian coal fields throughout northeastern Pennsylvania contain some of the highest concentrations of Rare Earth Elements. (…) These elements are critical components of everyday electronics and equipment used in the health care, transportation, and defense industries.  With our abundance of anthracite, we have the potential to create and support good-paying jobs, not just in the coal industry, but in manufacturing and related industries that rely on these elements.

It is critical for our national security that we turn to a domestic source of these minerals. Our military should not have to rely on China or any other country for the resources necessary to keep us safe, especially when those resources are readily available right here in Pennsylvania.” 

Similar projects are in the works around the country, with a West Virginia University’s Energy Institute project having moved into phase two of its efforts to recover REEs from coal mine drainage.  The Department of Energy is looking to award a substantially bigger grant of $20 million to the project that shows the greatest potential for extracting Rare Earths from coal in an economically viable fashion.

None of these projects may be able to compete with Rumpelstiltskin, but we also don’t live in a fairy tale world.  Considering that – after a brief dip thanks to a now-bankrupt domestic REE mining operation – our import dependency for REEs is back at 100%, it is quite an encouraging real-world development to see that policy makers, private sector executives and public university scientists are realizing the importance of this issue, and we’ll keep monitoring the progress of these projects.

The post “Materials Science Profiles of Progress” – REE Extraction From Coal appeared first on American Resources Policy Network.

This success was achieved in the context of public private partnerships CMI has engaged in to further its mission. According to CMI’s press release, the Idaho National Laboratory, a CMI member institution, sourced the raw materials and refined the oxides, while a CMI Industry member, Infinium, produced metal ingot from those oxides. Further processing work was completed at Ames Laboratory, CMI’s home research institution.  

Says CMI Director Alex King: 

“We were asked if it was still possible to make these magnets entirely within the U.S., now that magnet manufacturing has very largely moved overseas. This proves that we can apply advanced tools and technologies developed in the U.S. to get the job done – do it quickly, and do it rather more efficiently than it is being done elsewhere.”

As ARPN followers will know, REEs have not only become indispensable components of our hi-tech items ranging from smart phones over computers to televisions, they are also of critical importance for the proper function of many clean energy and defense technology components. Meanwhile, China has long held a near-total REE supply monopoly. While for a few short years, a now-bankrupt North American mining company sourced REEs domestically, thereby reducing our import reliance for REEs (with the lowest degree of net import reliance pegged at 63% in 2013), we are now once more 100% reliant on foreign imports to meet domestic REE needs.  

As such, CMI’s current REE work and other public-private partnerships the institute has entered into are highly relevant, and tie into the overall context of process improvements allowing for the extraction of minerals from unconventional sources. As Dan McGroarty explained in his most recent Congressional testimony before a U.S. Senate committee:

“Without in any way diminishing the dangers of our resource dependency (…) These are advances arising out of necessity – the need to efficiently extract minerals from low-grade deposits. In some cases, this effort is driving process improvements that point to the ability to extract minerals from unconventional sources, feedstocks if you will. I’m talking about historic mine waste piles, eWaste, and potentially and perhaps most interesting, extracting rare metals from coal deposits.”

While these are steps in the right direction, more needs to be done. “[A]t a time when state-backed enterprises from China and Russia are focused on locking up metals and mineral deposits worldwide,” we need a comprehensive and strategic approach to mineral resource security.

The bottom line according to McGroarty is this:

 ”If we are serious about ensuring U.S. military power and reviving American manufacturing, we must reverse the deep dependency on foreign metals and minerals, and treat American resource security with the same seriousness – and one would hope, the same success – as our approach to American energy security.”

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