Where Next-Generation Rare Earth Metals May Come From

retroworks writes "Great piece in The Atlantic by Kyle Wiens of IFIXIT.org, who visited and photographed the Molycorp Mountain Pass rare earth facility in California's Mojave Desert. The mine is the only source of rare earths in North America, one of the only alternatives to the mineral cartels in China, and one of the only sources for the key metals such as tantalum needed in cell phones. There is of course actually one other source of rare earth metals in the USA — recycled cell phones. Is the best 'state of the art' mining as good as the worst state of the art recycling? If the U.S. Department of Energy subsidizes the mine, will China open the floodgates and put it out of business? Or will electronics be manufactured with alternative materials before the mine ever becomes fully scaleable?"

Comments

Re:In a not so distant future...

[forkfail]

Long before that, they'll come from Afghanistan, in all likelihood:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=afghanistan-holds-enormous-bounty-of-rare-earths

(which may explain a few things...)

Re:Not the only place

[ColdWetDog]

However, it wouldn't be much fun to be running a mine in the middle of the desert.

Actually, high volume / low yield mining is probably best done in a desert (if it can be done in an environmentally sane fashion anywhere). Remember, these are not high grade ores. It's not like you pick axe out a block of Yttiribilium (or however you spell these silly names). You get a pile of rocks with a bit more Yttiribilium than the surrounding rocks and then you process it into a slurry with more Yttiribilium and then it goes off and gets smelted.

There was an interesting article somewhere suggesting that the best way to do this in terms of minimizing mining and water waste was to crush the ore, separate the rare earths using magnets and getting the concentration up to around 50%. It would then be economically feasible to haul that much smaller volume of rock to the a large, perhaps one off facility, that purified the material and dealt with the large amount of tainted water, dust and heavy metals that the refinery process entailed.