Japan discovers large quantity of rare earth, hopes to break China’s chokehold on supply
- By Grant Brunner on March 25, 2013 at 2:45 pm
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Good news! Japan has just discovered a large amount of rare earth elements in the seabed around Minami-Tori-shima island. While this is a boon to the tech field and consumers alike, this news undoubtedly comes as a disappointment for China. Turns out, that near-monopoly on rare earth materials was short lived for everyone’s favorite communist state.
From televisions to airplanes, rare earth elements are required for most modern electronics. Unfortunately, rare earths aren’t distributed equally around the world. By the luck of the draw, China makes out like a bandit now that so many industries are in need of these elements. The US, EU, and Japan even battled with China last year in the World Trade Organization over China’s attempt at jacking up rare earth prices. Fortunately, Japan’s findings combined with increased mining activity in other countries are starting to ease China’s chokehold on the world’s supply.
Tokyo University’s Yasuhiro Kato assumed the finding was a mistake when he first saw the “astronomically high level of rare earth minerals” in the mud sample. That’s what makes this discovery noteworthy. Rare earth elements aren’t actually all that hard to find, but they’re usually found in very tiny amounts. Back in 2011, Japan found a large supply of rare earth elements under the Pacific Ocean, but in concentrations of about 2000 parts per million. However, this latest find is reportedly 20-to-30 times more concentrated than China‘s rare earth ore.
This deposit of rare earth is an estimated 6.8 million metric tons sitting a little over three and a half miles under the ocean. Japan is now tasked with finding an economical way of mining the ore. While the real results of this find are still years away, the threat of Japan taking over the rare earths market should be sufficient enough to keep China in check. Even with China estimating that it has less than a third of the world’s reserves of rare earth minerals, it controls over 90% of the market. With any luck, China’s lead will shrink significantly over the next few years.
Considering how important these elements are, relying on one country to supply the lion’s share is scary. Not only is competition good for keeping the price down, but having a single point of failure is incredibly dangerous. If something were to happen to China’s mining operations right now, we would be in dire straits. All eyes are now on Japan — waiting to see if it can pull this off.
Image credit: CORE-Materials & Peggy Greb
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