U.S. Army To Process Rare Earths – Economics

Table of Contents

Current Affair

The United States (US) Army plans to fund the construction of a Rare Earths processing facility to secure the domestic supply of these minerals.

Rationale

China threatened to stop exporting Rare Earth materials to the US
to secure the domestic supply of minerals

Rare Earths

Rare Earth Metals are a set of 17 chemical elements in the periodic table.
15 lanthanides, scandium, yttrium
According to the Rare Earth Technology Alliance (RETA), the estimated size of the Rare Earth sector is between $10 billion and $15 billion.

Utility

building consumer electronics, in healthcare and advanced transportation.
technologies of computers and networks, communications, clean energy, environmental mitigation, etc.
manufacturing defense equipment.
space shuttle components, jet engine turbines, and drones.

Why and how does China dominate?

In China, the mining of Rare Earths began in the 1950s.
After the Cultural Revolution in China ended, the country focussed on exploiting its natural resources.
In 1992, China’s paramount leader Deng Xiaoping compared the status of Rare Earth reserves to that of oil in the Middle East.

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