China Considering Cuts In Rare-Earth Metal Exports

SillySnake sends in a report from the Telegraph on draft plans in China to restrict exports of rare earths. "Beijing is drawing up plans to prohibit or restrict exports of rare earth metals that are produced only in China and play a vital role in cutting edge technology, from hybrid cars and catalytic converters, to superconductors, and precision-guided weapons. A draft report by China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has called for a total ban on foreign shipments of terbium, dysprosium, yttrium, thulium, and lutetium. Other metals such as neodymium, europium, cerium, and lanthanum will be restricted to a combined export quota of 35,000 tonnes a year, far below global needs."

Comments

Re:What can I say. Slashdotters needs to get out m

[Attila Dimedici]

By Chinese standard, the fact that the US has so much porn is just unheard of. Porn is not only illegal but also considered immoral.

Hold it, I thought only right wing Christian nutjobs wanted to make porn illegal? Are you trying to tell me that the Chinese government is controlled by right wing Christian nut jobs?

Re:Oil refining capacity

[Zcar]

Actually the bottleneck has been the impossibility of bringing additional refining capacity online in the US.

True. And actually this isn't just the case in the USA; there are virtually no new refineries anywhere in the world.

While the US hasn't built new refineries, existing ones have been expanded with a near 2 million barrel per day increase (over 12%) from 1985 to present (most of the increase has come since 1995).

Re:The new "oil"

[Eddi3]

That's not at all what happened to Bush. He served two full terms, and then was no longer eligible for office. He was never voted out.

Chani has done this in other markets as well

[Terje Mathisen]

Until about 10 years ago, there were many magnesium manufacturers around the world, including one in my home town of Porsgrunn (in Norway).

When China decided that light metals was a crucial market for them, they started a bunch of very low-tech/high-pollusion magnesium smelters, and many/most Western competitors folded.

In the latest (for the year 1998) SFT (Norwegian EPA) regulations for the Porsgrunn factory (in norwegian), the limit on some pollutants was set to maximum 1 gram/year, I suspect the Chinese smelters are many orders of magnitude above this level.

Terje