The global fight for critical minerals is costly and damaging
nature.com
nature.com
“Sustainability, equity and security are all at risk in the rush to break China’s dominance over their production.”
- I can think of one entity which wouldn’t want China’s dominance of rare earth production broken and it’s not the DRC.
“China’s ascendancy is the result of forward thinking by the country’s leadership”
- Seems strangely flattering since it doesn’t seem like it adds anything to the arguments or the context.
“it is not in the interests of any nation to partner with just one other country or group of countries”
- I believe this is explicitly a CCP talking point (link below for reference). Obviously, other people might say it but it seems sort of… suspect? Like the article purports to make a moralistic claim about exploitation and then goes into pure realpolitik. In my opinion that’s the sort of thing you’d only say if you were wearing social justice as a mask and didn’t actually believe in it yourself.
https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/wjbxw/202302/t20230220_1102...
Submarines are pretty easy to detect once you've been here for a while tho http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html
An opposite argument could be make for semiconductors. In that case, the environmental approach is to NOT make multiple fabs, keep them in Taiwan / the Netherlands, and discourage China from making new fabs. This would be against China.
Generally, the environmental position favors not duplicating effort, which favors the current incumbent.
The editorial is arguing against trading blocs. In fact, it's arguing for some form of free trade. This benefits China in both that it is currently in a dominant position in terms of market and capacity, and also favors China in that it neutralizes one area where the US generally holds advantages - better soft power, and a being generally thought more favourably than China.
Chinese dominance of rare earth production is not sustainable, either, using lax regulations to externalize environmental and health hazards: leaking radioactive residue (like thorium) and other toxic waste, polluting water sources (including the Yellow River), neglecting worker safety, and abusing human rights.[1]
> “China’s ascendancy is the result of forward thinking by the country’s leadership”
One forward thinking of China is to move its operation through its state-owned enterprises to Africa, contaminating outside communities instead.[1]
[1]: https://hir.harvard.edu/not-so-green-technology-the-complica... "Not So “Green” Technology: The Complicated Legacy of Rare Earth Mining"
Gem Hunters Found the Lithium America Needs. Maine Won’t Let Them Dig It Up
https://time.com/6294818/lithium-mining-us-maine/
not so good news if you're indigenous:
Tribes object. But a federal ruling approves construction of the largest lithium mine
https://www.npr.org/2023/07/17/1188204958/tribes-object-fede...
A mining company is hunting for lithium, right on the edge of wildlife refuge
https://phys.org/news/2023-07-company-lithium-edge-wildlife-...
and, of course, it's not just Lithium - Copper trumps sacred land:
Battle for Oak Flat: How Apache opposition to a copper mine became a religious liberty test
https://phys.org/news/2023-06-oak-flat-apache-opposition-cop...
China‘s Iron Grip on the Rare Earth Magnet
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxpKcbg30e4
A Semiconductor Rare Earths Problem?
I think the original meaning of "rare" may have been in opposition to dense, rather than meaning scarce. They are not densely concentrated in the substrate they're taken from as you say. From M-W rare, "3. marked by wide separation of component particles."
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20150402-the-worst-place-...
Usually they consist of a few things in large quantities that are easy to neutralize - eg. sulphuric or nitric acid. And thats mixed in with small amounts of something that is natural yet toxic - eg. Mercury, lead, arsenic, etc.
The whole lot is typically in the form of a slurry with solids and lots of water.
It has to be kept wet, or the toxic solids will turn into dust and blow everywhere. It can't be allowed to get too wet, or it will overflow the containment pond.
As far as I can see, there is no real solution - while the acids can be neutralized, the heavy metals can't be locked back into solid rock form - at least not at the scale of these ponds. I suspect the best thing to do (apart from not mining at all) is to just make ponds as big as possible and let them settle for as many decades as possible, and eventually they'll turn back into mudstone-like rock.
Shouldn't it be possible to take that slurry and deliberately dry it out much faster, possibly even including a step that separates the products to some extent for separate processing or storage? If it were being dried out in a sealed processing facility, rather than a pond open to the air (and wildlife), the toxic dust wouldn't be a problem—indeed, it would be the end goal. Turn it to dust, compress the dust into something you can seal in a jar or whatever and then store the sealed jar. Or potentially even sell it; I bet some of these toxic byproducts would actually be something someone else wants for their own industrial processes.
Obviously even if it's possible, this isn't done because it would be more expensive—but if we, say, were more concerned with health and safety than profits, couldn't this be much less time-consuming and risky to the local water table than just letting it sit for decades or centuries?
The massive volume is by far the biggest problem, compared to the (relatively low) toxicity.
Like, that costs money and stuff.
As it stands, I think that companies shouldn't be allowed to offload negative externalities onto the public and the world at large. I think they should be required to clean up their own messes.
Most treatments require huge amounts of energy, which itself isn't very environmentally friendly.
So the solution may be quite simple: once the lake pH is adjusted to be not too acidic, pumping hydrogen sulfide into it should entrain any heavy metals in their natural form. This is a dangerous process, though, because hydrogen sulfide is an extremely toxic gas.
Driving your electric car straight to hell on a road paved with feelings.
https://ukraineinvest.gov.ua/en/industries/mining/#:~:text=U....
- singling out electrical vehicles is a bit disingenuous; there are lots of other consumers of rare earths. E.g. combustion engines have lots of exotic things on board and cobalt is used in oil refining. Lots of other industries use exotic minerals.
- A lot of this stuff can be recycled and already is. Especially valuable commodities used in batteries.
- There are alternate battery chemistries already being used in electric cars that have a lot less exotic materials. LFP batteries use no cobalt. Sodium ion batteries use no cobalt or lithium. Likewise, Tesla announced new engines that don't depend on rare earths a few montsh ago.
So, yeah, a world without cars sounds great if you're young and healthy, and there's good public transportation and bike paths and such. But for some people, it's cars or being a shut-in, and so, yeah, they are really stubborn about hanging on to their cars.
They're not the majority of car users. But you can't ignore them when you design your utopian future.
We think electric cars and GPUs are pushing us ahead. But in reality we are driving the wedge in deeper.
I’m afraid where we end up is like James Hansen said about fossil fuels, but relevant in general, with a "different, practically uninhabitable planet" by triggering a "low-end runaway greenhouse effect."
The only way to actually stop the destruction is if we slow down mining and learn to do more with what we have already mined. To make what we already consumed reusable and stop mining altogether if possible. For fossil fuels, and the rare earth minerals destroying fresh water and food supplies and air quality.
The vast majority of costs are already abstracted away. When you drive to work, do you think about the massive environmental cost of all the concrete and steel that went into building the roads and bridges that you drive over?
Yet those costs, which nobody talks about, are of similar scale to the environmental costs of all cars.
But if driving a car is cheaper (and more fun) then we are doomed to dedicate more land to asphalt, and all the hidden costs thereof.
Mining isn’t a huge source of greenhouse emissions. It’s not good for the local environment, but it’s necessary. Recycling and reuse is also a grand idea, you’re right about that. Except for plastics, which never made sense.
Electric cars are unequivocally a good thing. Every electric car takes a fossil fuel guzzling car off the road. Once a family has an electric car they tend to use it whenever possible, making the effect even more pronounced. Some people float the ridiculous argument that they emit more greenhouse gases in manufacturing and mining than they save over their lifetime. Firstly, gasoline cars also cost energy to manufacture and gasoline also takes energy to extract and refine and transport. Secondly, electric cars break even within the first few years of use. Even in todays world where the electric grid still has a lot of fossil fuel generation.
Electric vehicles can be a good thing if we also dramatically reduce our consumption of transportation and bring our political systems, lifestyles and economies in harmony with planetary boundaries. Without a corresponding sea change in expectations and way of life, they just dig us deeper into the energy trap.
But cars are still necessary, and that’s not about to change.
We need to make cars less necessary for life. It's not an easy task, but it's a question of priorities. Do we care more about convenience in the near term, or prospects for life in the long term?
I think so from the bottom of my heart and try to live by it.
Also there’s budget electric cars, and even Uber drivers purchase them. While I agree that they’re not that affordable yet, they’re not a luxury good either (although some models definitely are.)
EVs are key to “civilizational resilience”, when combined with the sharp increase in solar and renewable energy that we’re also going through.
Fantasizing about telling all of society to stop going places isn’t realistic. The future doesn’t have to be miserable to also be sustainable.
(But currently we aren’t even slowing down the coming “train crash”, we are merely decreasing the acceleration into the wall of food shortages and other horrors.)
Fresh water is not that big of a deal, it’s plentiful and cheap in most places. Desalination works really well, look at Israel.
Cars are required for most people to live their lives and make a living. I don’t know how you expect we’ll just magically do without.
> Fresh water is not that big of a deal, it’s plentiful and cheap in most places. Desalination works really well, look at Israel.
Half of the United States is in a more or less permanent water crisis which will get worse every passing year if we don't dramatically change use patterns. Not to mention the rest of the world. Desalination works, but it's energy- and materials-hungry. Energy is not getting any more abundant unless we have a breakthrough massively raising the sinking cap on civilizational EROI, e.g. fusion.
> Cars are required for most people to live their lives and make a living. I don’t know how you expect we’ll just magically do without.
Cars have been around for a little over a century. Somehow we managed before that. Even now, there are only 1.5 billion cars on the planet. Most human beings alive today do not have access to a car. I wonder how they do it?
You're right that a sustainable future doesn't have to miserable.
Heh ??! Mining is a huge source of GHG, especially if you count scope 3 (you should): https://www.mining-technology.com/features/cop26-scope3-net-...
> Within mining, scope 1 and 2 emissions account for 4%-7% of global greenhouse gas emissions. This rises to 28% of global emissions however when accounting for scope 3
Smelting and processing of raw materials is a big source of GHG.
Most of scope 2 and 3 emissions go away if you decarbonize the electric grid though.
Absolutely, but that’s not what I said neither the article I link. Is talks about the emissions of mining itself and the scopes associated of that activity. It’s not mining within another activity scope.
The conclusion is basically : scope 1 and 2 emissions of mining itself is quite small compare to its scope 3 emissions. The reason is mining activity uses a HUGE quantity of steel which -in this context- produce a lot of GHG.
> Most of scope 2 and 3 emissions go away if you decarbonize the electric grid though.
I guess you talk about derived goods “we” consume away from the mines… so your assomption of scope 2 is true but as stated in the article a linked, the mining part of our scope 3 will largely more benefit of decarbonizing the steel industry (the grid won’t have much effect). But guess what ? That’s (very) expensive and the only ones that cares are some smart Norwegians.
Electric cars will reduce demand for gasoline. Some people say this won't affect how much oil is pumped out of the ground, because we still need the other fractions.
That's not exactly the case though - gasoline is effectively now subsidizing the heavier fractions. When that changes, heavier fractions will also be more expensive.
How that will affect demand for crude, I'm not equipped to tell.
The most interesting things about electric cars may be if they transform how our grid works, from baseload to (much more) spot-market.
I'm not sure if that's the gasoline subsidizing the heavier fractions. It might be the other way around. There would be more heavier fractions available if we didn't crack them, and therefore they'd be cheaper.