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View Full Version : China is building a rare earth stockpile


Sparty
02-08-2011, 12:48 AM
SHANGHAI - China is building strategic reserves in rare-earth metals, an effort that could give Beijing increased power to influence global prices and supplies in a sector it already dominates.

China is building reserves of such rare-earth metals as neodymium.

Details of the stockpiling plans haven't been made public. But the outlines of the effort have emerged in recent statements from Chinese government agencies, state-controlled companies and reports in government-run media. The reports say storage facilities built in recent months in the Chinese province of Inner Mongolia can hold more than the 39,813 metric tons China exported last year. read full article (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704124504576117511251161274.html?m od=WSJ_topics_obama)

The article references: "A Pentagon estimate that while only 5% of demand for rare-earth metals in the U.S. comes from the military, the U.S. is nevertheless "completely reliant on China for the production of some of [the Pentagon's] most powerful weapons."

It is interesting to note that the heavy REEs that are mined in the Jiangxi Province (Yttrium, Dysprosium and Terbium) are also found in Australia's Alkane Resources advanced DZP project. I wonder if this is why Alkane has been in talks with the US DOD?

http://www.australianrareearths.com/images/alk-terbium-dysprosium.gif

Resty
02-10-2011, 06:17 PM
[quote]SHANGHAI - China is building strategic reserves in rare-earth metals, an effort that could give Beijing increased power to influence global prices and supplies in a sector it already dominates. China is building reserves of such rare-earth metals as neodymium. Details of the stockpiling plans haven't been made public. But the outlines of the effort have emerged in recent statements from Chinese government agencies, state-controlled companies and reports in government-run media. The reports say storage facilities built in recent months in the Chinese province of Inner Mongolia can hold more than the 39,813 metric tons China exported last year. read full article The article references: "A Pentagon estimate that while only 5% of demand for rare-earth metals in the U.S. comes from the military, the U.S. is nevertheless "completely reliant on China for the production of some of [the Pentagon's] most powerful weapons." It is interesting to note that the heavy REEs that are mined in the Jiangxi Province (Yttrium, Dysprosium and Terbium) are also found in Australia's Alkane Resources advanced DZP project. I wonder if this is why Alkane has been in talks with the US DOD? http://www.australianrareearths.com/...dysprosium.gif