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Monopolies do not last A year ago I wrote about the Chinese monopoly position in Rare Earths and how unlikely it was to last. It seems I was correct, according to this item Glenn Reynolds linked to today:
Elk Creek, Neb. (population 112), may not be so tiny much longer. Reports suggest that the southeastern Nebraska hamlet may be sitting on the world’s largest untapped deposit of “rare earth” minerals, which have proved to be indispensable to a slew of high-tech and military applications such as laser pointers, stadium lighting, electric car batteries and sophisticated missile-guidance systems.
And the best part of it? The deposits are not in California!
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“Tranquil Rural Beauty Spot Becomes Centre Of Mining Operation” almost beats my personal favourite headline: “AIDS Cure Found In Dolphin Livers”.
To be a bit of a downer, I wouldn’t bet on them producing rare earth metals from that deposit before 2020. The metallurgical challenging involved in REMs mining are notorious. It will take a while…
I recall reading somewhere that some Japanese have made a similar discovery, somewhere in the Pacific, I think.
Did a google map search just to see where Elk Creek, Nebraska was. I love how this map has exactly one landmark highlighted:
The Village Tavern
A town of 112 are able to keep a bar going, my kind of place.
(Link)
Towns that size in Australia will generally have a post office, a general store, a petrol station, a hot food outlet of some kind, and a pub/hotel. (These may all be combined into one or two businesses). Customers will often come from a long way away.
Towns that size in Wales will have two churches and three pubs.
I like the ratio too, Kevin:-)
My favourite ever headline was from the always-reliable Sun:
“Mile-high Mandy Gets Randy on Brandy”.
To get back on topic, the said Amanda had a temporary monopoly on a certain ardent swain with whom she shared an adjoining business class seat on the red-eye. That monopoly required no regulatory intervention to close it down, merely the landing of the aircraft in question and the reassertion by the spouses of both parties of their contractual and conjugal rights.
The Sun headline, I think you’ll agree, is more succinct.
The problem of course is that the US will never be allowed to exploit these resources.
The EPA will make them uneconomical.
The amount of natural resource we are forced to just lay fallow in this country are amazing.
And the best part II: it’s a Canadian company!
Mountain Pass news
West Australia mine
Cheers
David, how I wish that were true. I just spent a week in Forrest City, Ar. Not a bar in sight… The only one I could find was in a hotel which was no longer there. I drive to Memphis to get some decent food and beer
Richard,
Well, I guess that’s the difference between Nebraska and Arkansas. A lot of Nebraska was settled by Germans (Volga Germans specifically.) If you got Germans you got beer, and places that serve beer.
Quantum isn’t it? They hope to mine an NbYF carbonatite.
Can be done, certainly, although they’d be the first to do it commercially. And if they are able to get the rare earths out economically (not a certain matter) then all those mining the NbYF pegmatites will be tempted to do so: Niobec in Quebec, CBMM in Brazil etc.
In fact I know that Niobec is considering just this as I’ve talked to them about it.
And then there’s Molycorp, Lynas, Steenkampskraal, Arafura, Avalon, all in various stages of production (the first three either online or will be this year or next), the next 200 junior miners all looking for funding and even, if we want to get silly about it, the 200,000 tonnes a year of rare earths we currently throw away in the red mud of the Bayer Process.
So there’s not going to be any shortage of rare earth mixed concentrates.
What there is and will be is a shortage of processing capability to separate the 15 lanthanides, one from the other.
momo: if it is valuable enough, they will find a way.
If they have to, they will haul the raw ore via train to Canada to process it.
“If they have to, they will haul the raw ore via train to Canada to process it.”
Nah, you don’t have to do that. Crush it, treat it, flocculate it (no, really) and then stick it in a furnace with some iron oxide and aluminium and coal. Set light to it all, you get ferro niobium. Extract, crush and sell.
Then you can get the rare earths from the slag left over.
Which leads you to still having a problem which is how to separate the 15 lanthanides one from the other.
Tim:
Never underestimate the ability of the US EPA to make crap up. Mines are evil ( in there eyes ), but can’t be stopped under the mining laws in place. But processing plants enjoy no such protection.
If Obambam decides the eco-nuts need it as a sop, they will cheerfully sacrifice ANY US industry on the alter of Gaia.