Western users of heavy rare earths say that they have no way of figuring out what proportion of the minerals they buy from China comes from responsibly operated mines. Licensed and illegal mines alike sell to itinerant traders. They buy the valuable material with sacks of cash, then sell it to processing centers in and around Guangzhou that separate the rare earths from each other.Companies that buy these rare earths, including a few in Japan and the West, turn them into refined metal powders."I don't know if part of that feed, internal in China, came from an illegal mine and went in a legal separator," said David Kennedy, the president of Great Western Technologies in Troy, Mich., which imports Chinese rare earths and turns them into powders that are sold worldwide.
Western users of heavy rare earths say that they have no way of figuring out what proportion of the minerals they buy from China comes from responsibly operated mines. Licensed and illegal mines alike sell to itinerant traders. They buy the valuable material with sacks of cash, then sell it to processing centers in and around Guangzhou that separate the rare earths from each other.
Companies that buy these rare earths, including a few in Japan and the West, turn them into refined metal powders.
"I don't know if part of that feed, internal in China, came from an illegal mine and went in a legal separator," said David Kennedy, the president of Great Western Technologies in Troy, Mich., which imports Chinese rare earths and turns them into powders that are sold worldwide.
Lindsey Hilsum of Independent Television News examines how mining rare earth minerals -- considered to be an obscure yet profitable industry, is causing a major environmental dilemma in China.
Chinese pay toxic price for a green world - Times Online (2009.12.6)
Seepage from the lake has poisoned the surrounding farmland. "The crops stopped growing after being watered in these fields," said Wang Cun Gang, a farmer. The local council paid villagers compensation for loss of income. "They tested our water and concluded that neither people nor animals should drink it, nor is it usable for irrigation." This is the price Chinese peasants are paying for the low carbon future. Rare earths, a class of metallic elements that are highly reactive, are essential for the next generation of "green" technologies. The battery in a Toyota Prius car contains more than 22lb of lanthanum. Low-energy lightbulbs need terbium. The permanent magnets used in a 3 megawatt wind turbine use 2 tons of neodymium and other rare earths. <...> "If the purpose of putting hybrid vehicles on the road is to lower our dependence on foreign oil, and all we're doing is buying cars that need Chinese rare earth materials, aren't we trading one dependence for another?" asked Mark Smith, chief executive of Molycorp Minerals, a US mining firm. <...> Preparing a rare earth mine to western environmental standards is costly. According to Dudley Kingsnorth, an Australian expert, China can mine the elements at a third of the cost, partly because of lax standards. "I think it will be at least 10 years before China will match our standards," he said. ...
Seepage from the lake has poisoned the surrounding farmland. "The crops stopped growing after being watered in these fields," said Wang Cun Gang, a farmer. The local council paid villagers compensation for loss of income. "They tested our water and concluded that neither people nor animals should drink it, nor is it usable for irrigation."
This is the price Chinese peasants are paying for the low carbon future. Rare earths, a class of metallic elements that are highly reactive, are essential for the next generation of "green" technologies. The battery in a Toyota Prius car contains more than 22lb of lanthanum. Low-energy lightbulbs need terbium. The permanent magnets used in a 3 megawatt wind turbine use 2 tons of neodymium and other rare earths.
<...>
"If the purpose of putting hybrid vehicles on the road is to lower our dependence on foreign oil, and all we're doing is buying cars that need Chinese rare earth materials, aren't we trading one dependence for another?" asked Mark Smith, chief executive of Molycorp Minerals, a US mining firm.
Preparing a rare earth mine to western environmental standards is costly. According to Dudley Kingsnorth, an Australian expert, China can mine the elements at a third of the cost, partly because of lax standards. "I think it will be at least 10 years before China will match our standards," he said. ...
'Rare earth' shortage threatens green revolution - Channel 4 News (2009.12.9)
Champions of a low carbon future have yet to wake up to the environmental price Chinese workers and villagers are paying. At Copenhagen politicians talk of cutting carbon emissions, but they cannot meet any targets without 'rare earth' - that means a sustainable supply and not all from China.
The permanent magnets used in a 3 megawatt wind turbine use 2 tons of neodymium and other rare earths.
Can't speak to the accuracy of this figure, but i can say that more than 90% of all wind turbines, including those of 3MW scale, use no permanent magnets at all. The industry could survive without neodymium if it had to, though admittedly there is a reason why the generator part of the power train is moving toward PM. "Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage." - Anaďs Nin
