Rare earths, this is what the American MP Materials will do for the Pentagon
MP Materials, which operates the United States' only major rare-earth mine, wants to build an in-house metalworking supply chain. The goal is the detachment from China and the production of magnets for electric vehicles (and the Pentagon)
At Mountain Pass in southeastern California is the only major rare earth mine in the entire western hemisphere. Rocks mined from the ground are crushed and liquefied into what Gizmodo has aptly described as a "metal soup" (the rare earth group is made up of seventeen metals). However, the "soup" is shipped to China for the elements to be separated, refined and transformed into powerful magnets for consumer electronics, wind turbines, electric vehicles, drones and missiles. This cycle is a problem for the United States, which will increasingly need refined rare earths to power the energy and digital transitions (as well as the defense industry) but do not want to become dependent on China, an opposing nation that could decide to use supplies as a geopolitical weapon, restricting or cutting off supplies to harm Washington.
MP MATERIALS PLANS
MP Materials, the company that has been managing the Mountain Pass mine since 2017 – the previous owner, Molycorp, was unable to make a profit -, intends to break its dependence on China and should soon start the rare earth separation operations directly at the mine site: since 2015, the United States no longer has the capacity to process these elements. MP Materials also promises that its rare earth processing activities will have a lower environmental impact than in Asia.
In 2022, the Mountain Pass mine alone accounted for 14 percent of global rare earth mining: 42,999 tons. In 2018, the output stopped at 14,000 tons; in 2019 it had already doubled, to 28,000 tons.
According to University of Delaware geographer and rare earth geographer Julie Klinger, MP Materials' future refining capabilities have the potential to be “the best-case scenario in terms of diversifying the global supply chain” of these metals.
PREDICTIONS ON THE DEMAND FOR RARE EARTHS
The energy transition will cause a significant increase in the demand for rare earth magnets, needed for the manufacture of wind turbines and electric vehicles. By 2030, demand for rare-earth magnets in the US electric mobility industry could be nearly six times higher than 2020 levels by 2030, according to a study by the Department of Energy. (emerging) offshore wind industry could grow from zero to 10,000 tons.
In the rest of the world, much the same will happen. According to a study by Adamas Intelligence, the global market value of rare earths for magnets – such as neodymium and praseodymium – will increase five-fold by 2040, driven by electric vehicles and wind power components. However, by 2040, there is a risk of a deficit of 90,000 tons of neodymium-praseodymium oxide (NdPr), a volume equivalent to the entire global production in 2022.
CHINA DOMINATES THE MARKET
To date, only one country dominates the rare earth market: China. In 2020, Gizmodo recalls, Beijing accounted for 58 percent of these metals extraction, 89 percent of their separation, 90 percent of refining and 92 percent of magnet production. Both mining and processing have a high environmental impact, also because rare earths tend to be present in minerals containing radioactive elements such as thorium and uranium.
– Read also: Does China have a problem with rare earths?
A 700 MILLION DOLLAR INVESTMENT
MP Materials plans to invest $700 million in rare-earth metal (dysprosium and terbium, in particular) separation and processing capabilities, while reactivating and upgrading the Mountain Pass facility. The company was awarded a $35 million contract by the Department of Defense.
The rare earths processed at Mountain Pass will no longer be shipped to China but to Fort Worth, Texas, where a refining plant is being built: the material will be used for the production of alloys and magnets for General Motors electric vehicles. The quantities of rare earths refined by American plants that will be used for defense are not clear – the Pentagon has not released any comments on the matter.
MP Materials will have to manage not only the environmental problem (the management of waste water, in particular) associated with the production of rare earths, but also the problem of costs. As explained to Gizmodo Eric Schelter, professor of chemistry at the University of Pennsylvania, to date there is no market for cerium, a rare earth element, which will therefore have to be treated as waste, raising operating costs. Profiting from rare earth production is difficult because of the large amount of low-value material that must be discarded and managed.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/energia/terre-rare-mountain-pass-mp-materials/ on Fri, 23 Jun 2023 05:47:41 +0000.