Dobrescu, Emilian M. (2024), Rare Earth in Other Countries Except China, Intelligence Info, 3:3, 94-104, https://www.intelligenceinfo.org/rare-earths-in-other-countries-except-china/
Abstract
Bolivia has large deposits of Rare Earth Elements (REE), Canadians already explore in the south of the country in search of REE. Australia and Brazil have recently identified such deposits; but no new mining operation started sooner than 2014. Issues are not given by the rarity of REE, but by the difficulty of their extraction.
Keywords: rare earths, rare earth elements, Afghanistan, Australia, Bolivia, Canada, Gabon, Republic of Moldova, United States
Pământuri rare în alte țări, cu excepția Chinei
Rezumat
Bolivia are depozite mari de elemente de Pământuri rare (REE), canadienii deja explorează în sudul țării în căutarea REE. Australia și Brazilia au identificat recent astfel de depozite; dar nici o nouă exploatare minieră nu a putut să înceapă mai devreme de 2014. Problemele nu sunt date de raritatea REE, ci de dificultatea extragerii acestora.
Cuvinte cheie: pământuri rare, elemente pământuri rare, Afganistan, Australia, Bolivia, Canada, Gabon, Republica Moldova, Statele Unite
INTELLIGENCE INFO, Volumul 3, Numărul 3, Septembrie 2024, pp. 94-104
ISSN 2821 – 8159, ISSN – L 2821 – 8159,
URL: https://www.intelligenceinfo.org/rare-earths-in-other-countries-except-china/
© 2024 Emilian M. DOBRESCU. Responsabilitatea conținutului, interpretărilor și opiniilor exprimate revine exclusiv autorilor.
Rare Earths in Other Countries Except China
Dr. Emilian M. DOBRESCU[1]
dobrescu@acad.ro
[1] Membru titular al Academiei Oamenilor de Știință
Introducere
Bolivia has large deposits of Rare Earth Elements (REE), Canadians already explore in the south of the country in search of REE. Australia and Brazil have recently identified such deposits; but no new mining operation started sooner than 2014. Issues are not given by the rarity of REE, but by the difficulty of their extraction.
Afghanistan
In January of 1984, shortly after the outbreak of hostilities in the” war with the Soviets” the director of Afghan Department of Geology publishes a report that the subsoil of the country had a large variety of mineral resources, including iron, chrome, gold, silver, sulphur, talc, magnesium, marble and lapis lazuli. It was only a superficial estimate, Afghan geologists not having at the time the performing equipment with which to evaluate all the minerals in the subsoil or at least the size of deposits in question. Information provided by Afghan geologists had already reached the ears of the Soviets, who even before the beginning of their presence in Afghanistan knew that this arid country hides also other riches than the huge deposits of natural gas, which the Kremlin was aware since 1957, when Russian geologists were investigating the natural gas reserves near the river Amu Daria.
Afghan government at that time was a puppet supported by the former Soviet Union: therefore, the authorities in Kabul were preparing to develop and exploit mineral resources based on technology of extraction and processing ex-Soviet, together with the engineers trained in Moscow; obviously the former USSR intended to keep the lion’s share for itself. Another treasure long sought and the eyes of ex-
Soviet were aching after it, consisted in Afghan uranium reserves very popular throughout the world since they provided the raw material for nuclear weapons whose development was at its peak to mid-80s of the last century. Over the Soviet-Afghan plans however dust spread out after the defeat of the former URSS by mujahideen, event concluded with Russian withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989.
In 2004, American geologists, sent to Afghanistan as part of a team rebuilding, they found a number of strange maps in the warehouse of Afghan Geological Survey Office in Kabul. At first evaluation, the maps presented new data on mineral deposits of the country. U.S. team learned later that the data were collected by Russian mining experts detached here during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. In the rush of the withdrawal in 1989, all maps and materials made by Russian were abandoned.
During the chaos of the ’90s, when Afghanistan was troubled by endless civil wars and iron regime of the Taliban, a small group of Afghan geologists managed to protect maps, hiding them in their houses. Afghans geologists have returned Afghan Geological Office only after the American invasion and overthrow of the Taliban regime in 2001.[2]
In November 2009, not coincidentally, a team of specialists from Pentagon and American geologists discovered mineral deposits in Afghanistan worth about 1 trillion (a thousand billion) of dollars.[3] In early September 2010, the Minister of Mines of Afghanistan, Wahidullah Shahrani came out at the ramp with a statement which, literally overthrew the stock exchanges in London, New York and Tokyo. Afghan official said that, following repeated research, carried out by American geologists and Pentagon specialists, the deposits value of natural minerals, initially estimated at about 1 trillion dollars is actually much higher.
According to data submitted by American scholars, only lithium reserves in Afghanistan are higher than those held by Bolivia, the country considered, by 2009, the first world exporter. Similarly, the natural reserves of copper and iron are well above the original estimate. Only iron reserves in Bamyan province are higher than those in Western Europe. Shahrani has said that U.S. data, according to which mineral reserves found would be worth „only” 1,000 billion dollars, were launched particularly, because a year ago Washington did not want to destabilize profile markets by announcing a sum of their value of about 3,000 billion dollars.
According to some U.S. officials, the new discovery has fundamentally changed the economy of Afghanistan, and the course of the unjustly war held by the U.S.A. for these resources, which are actually the property of Afghanistan. New warehouses, previously unknown, which contain huge veins of iron, copper, cobalt or gold and critical industrial metals such as lithium, are so big and include so many minerals essential to modern industry that Afghanistan could be transformed eventually in one of the most important mining centres in the world. According to an internal memo of Pentagon, Afghanistan could become „Saudi Arabia of lithium,” a key material in the manufacture of batteries for laptops.[4]
The Afghan government and the president Hamid Karzai were informed about the new discovery. Although it may take several years to develop a mining industry here, the potential is so great that officials and executives in the industry believe they could attract heavy investments, even before mines are profitable, providing the possibility to create jobs that could detract from the war. „There is a stunning potential here,” said Gen. David H. Petraeus, the head of U.S. Central Commandment. „There are a lot of conditions, of course, but I think there is a huge potential,” he added.
United States announced that the discovery of these large deposits of minerals in Afghanistan is of such a magnitude that it could modify the Afghan economy and the course of the war waged by the Allied coalition, led by U.S.A. for so many years. The deposits contain ores of iron, cobalt and gold, as well as rare metals such as lithium, essential for the modern electronic industry.
Perhaps the most coveted „treasure in Afghanistan” is in huge lithium deposits discovered by Americans in the autumn of 2009. Alone, only lithium reserves could pull Afghanistan from the severe poverty of today and – in theory – would turn it into a richer country than the 10 eastern European countries joined in the European Union on the occasion of the wave of integration in May 2004. It is known that the lithium is the raw material for batteries and some parts of laptops, mobile phones and other devices, from the pocket to cosmic shuttles!
The value of the newly discovered mineral deposits puts in a new light the Afghanistan economy, based especially on opium production and drug trafficking as well as on the aid from the United States and other industrialized countries. Afghanistan’s gross domestic product is only 12 billion dollars. American and Afghan officials have agreed to discuss about these deposits extremely valuable in a difficult time of war.
American officials acknowledge, however, that the mineral discoveries will have, almost certainly, a double-edged impact. Instead of bringing peace, mineral wealth may require the Taliban to intensify their struggle to regain control of the country. However, corruption, which is already quite high in Karzai government could be amplified by the new wealth, particularly if a handful of oligarchs who have personal ties with the president take control of resources.
Last year, the Afghan minister of mines was accused by American officials of accepting 30 million dollars bribe to award China the rights to develop copper mines. The minister was later replaced.
Experts believe that without „its mining culture”, it will take decades until Afghanistan will be able to fully exploit the minerals. Mineral deposits are scattered throughout the country, including in the south and east regions, along the border with Pakistan, where there were recorded the most intense battles in the war led by Americans against Taliban insurgents.
The Pentagon has already begun to help Afghans set up a system to deal with mineral development. International accounting firms that have expertise in mining operation contracts have committed to consult with the Afghan Ministry of Mines, and technical data are ready to be delivered to multinational mining companies and other potential foreign investors. Pentagon helps Afghan officials in their efforts to seek bids on mining operation since the autumn of 2011.
China could provide in this new context exactly what is missing in Afghanistan: machinery for extraction. Afghanistan is totally deprived of mining infrastructure and it will take maybe decades until it can get profit from these deposits barely discovered. „This country has no mining culture,” said Jack McEdlin, American geologist involved in geological prospecting. It has some small artisanal mines, but now it takes a lot of mines, much larger, which require a little more than a «colander»”.
It is not actually one giant deposit: the whole country seems to be crammed with mineral deposits; the discovery seems to have been made possible thanks to some old maps found in the library of the Afghan Geological Institute in Kabul, maps presenting most mineral deposits of the country. These maps and satellite mapping have been studied since 2004, and American geologists have confirmed the data collected by Soviet geologists; they proved the existence of some huge mineral deposits. „There were maps, but the mining development could not start because of the 30-35 years of war,” said Ahmad Hujabre, Afghan engineer in the Ministry of Mines.
Based on these maps, American geologists have made aerial prospections with a satellite Orion P-3 of the Navy, over about 70 percent of Afghan territory, obtaining three-dimensional results of underground mineral deposits, results which were astounding: deposits of copper, iron and REE are so important that it could make from Afghanistan one of the major world producer; the labelled deposits contain niobium, rare metal, particularly important for the manufacture of rockets, nuclear energy, condensers and for producing the niobium of lithium, a crystal capable of changing the refractive index, and therefore used in the manufacture of high-capacity optical fibres. There are also very large gold deposits in Pashtun, as well as huge deposits of lithium in the province Ghanzi. The news of the discovery of these deposits remained silent for many years or was deliberately ignored.[5]
Australia
Lynas Company, which has a deposit in the region Mount Weld in Western Australia will be able to develop this mining project thanks to a long-term supply contract with Rhodia. For reasons of environmental conservation, this company stopped the REE extraction, starting with the monazite, associated to the sands of beach containing titan, in the operation located near La Rochelle.
Bolivia
Since 2009, Bolivia announced that can supply the world with lithium for at least the next 5,000 years[6]. And it wants to exploit this precious mineral alone, without appeal to foreign industries.
Japanese companies – Mitsubishi and Sumitomo, Korean companies – Kores, Hyundai and LG, Finnish companies- European Batteries and French companies – Bollore and Eramet want to exploit more than a decade Bolivian lithium. In late October 2010, they were announced by Bolivia that only at the horizon of 2014-2015 can expect to possible partnerships in this regard. Until then, Bolivia wants to endorse alone the exploiting of this precious mineral.
Lithium is the raw material for manufacturing latest generation battery for cars, especially electric cars, portable phones, I-pods, personal computers. The fact that Bolivia remains mistress of its resources is a challenge: the country must get out of poor exploitation sign of raw materials, fact which dates from the occupation period by Spanish. For, despite the considerable mining riches they possess – silver, gold, tin – Bolivia remains one of the poorest countries in the world.
Although lithium deposits are expected to bring wealth in Bolivia, nothing is less certain that they will become operational. Since 2008, Bolivia announced it wants to begin operation of this light and soft metal, which is abundant on the surface of its salty lakes in Andes. But 10 years after its neighbour state, Chile, began to do so; Chile is now the first world producer of lithium.
Bolivia does not have even a pilot plant whose operation was announced in late 2010, but in May 2011 it was still under construction! If Evo Morales predicted „a revolution of the global energy die” due to Bolivian lithium exploitation, he announced then that industrial phase of the project is provided barely in 2014-2015, if there will be no delay again…
First, Bolivia must catch up Chile, which supplies at export about 40,000 tons of lithium carbonate annually. Almost 10 times more than the current Bolivian pilot plant capacity. Bolivian State should invest 900 million dollars to develop a competitive industry in the field. Or, funding pilot plant has just collected the 7 million dollars needed for its delayed entry into service and there has to be build other 8 plants for the extraction of lithium carbonate and other mineral components likely to interest chemical or phytosanitary industry (fertilizers of soil), elements as boric acid, chloride and potassium sulphate, etc.
Bolivian resources of lithium are considerable – they were estimated to an amount of 24 million tons by American geologists and 100 million tons by Bolivian experts, i.e. about 33 times higher than the Chilean reserves. Their exploitation should not fret local populations who have not yet obtained any benefit from them[7]. Mining activity of the pilot plant has not generated the expected occupation of human resources, about 100 miners of this plant, being delocalized employees by Mining Corporation of Bolivia (for short COMIBOL); operation with one pilot station has not improved at all the locale infrastructures. Electricity, made at great expense in the pilot plant zone is increasingly desired in surrounding villages. Regarding environmental impact, residents and NGOs stir because of the threat to the water resources of the region, especially in the zone Salar de Uyuni.
In this area already very deserted – Salar is the largest salt desert on the planet – it lives mainly from the quinoa culture and tourism. Pilot plant of producing lithium lies not far from the Rio Grande River, a proximity which increases fear of water quality pollution. For now the only solution adopted by COMIBOL to treat mining waste resulting from the extraction of lithium is to store it in a special place on a dried up arm of the river, hoping that the rainy season will not affect their reabsorption into the soil.
Tim McKenna, vice president of Chemetall, the American company that shares with the Chilean company SQM, 70 per cent of exploitation lithium from the salt desert Atacama said: „In Chile, we have had 15 years of attempts to achieve industrial production levels. And with no geographical and logistical obstacles that Bolivia knows”. Because the country has no suitable infrastructure for the access to the sea. Seen from this perspective, the term 2014 seems unrealistic. Provided Bolivia decide to take an ally consisting of a foreign industrial firm. Conglomerates specialized in the industrialization of lithium are already tuned[8].
Canada
In June 3, 2010, the Canadian company Dios announced that it discovered several deposits containing REE in the complex of carbonates in Shipshaw, near Saguenay, Quebec, located at 7 km from niobium mine and infrastructures for ferrous-niobium operation owned by the company Iamgold[9]. A series of 90 analyzed rock samples highlighted niobium reaching 0.053% Nb205 (niobium oxide), 12% P205 (phosphate, apatite), very high content, and 0.487% TREEO (oxides composed of rare metals, excluding yttrium and zirconium). TREEO compound varies in deposit depending on the depth of operation between 0.172 and 0.700%.
The first well was drilled almost vertically in the weakest part of the magnetic anomaly containing only 6 feet of so-called „dead land” situated over 11 meters of sediments from the Ordovician period, situated above the metalliferous complex. What is interesting to note, according to the analyzed samples is that the first meters of deposit have the following content of niobium and REE: 0.022% Nb2O5, 0.228% TREEO and 0.253% ZrO2 (zirconium oxide).
Geological drillings made by Dios have confirmed the discovery of a parallel deposit, where there were analyzed 15-20 samples for evaluation of the content in niobium and tantalum of the carbonate complex Shipshaw.
Gabon
At the end of August 2010, the Gabonese state announced its involvement in the activities of the foreign company Eramet and its Gabonese subsidiary Comilog. Patrick Buffet, CEO of the mining group and the president Ali Bongo Ondimba, evoked various joint projects in the field of REE. Gabonese state allowed subsidiary Comilog the research of the deposit Mabounie containing niobium, REE, tantalum and uranium to assess its potential for exploitation.
Republic of Moldova
40 years ago, in the Soviet Socialist Republic of Moldova, REE were used extensively in more than 20 industrial branches[10]. Among the most important fields of application of REE there were since then: metallurgy and equipment industry, glass and chemical industry, electronics, radio-technics and contemporary radio-electronics, medicine and pharmaceutical technique, optical and lighting technique, aviation and cosmic, shipping and military technique, jewellery production and agriculture.
After A. Popuiac[11], REE production is widespread in India, Brazil, Austria, England, France, Germany, Russia, China. In the U.S.A., the development and improvement of enterprises producing essential REE is stimulated by the government and NASA. In the central region of the Dniester river basin, over several decades it has been conducted a complex geological study aimed at determining the metallogenic features of geological formations in this area. Based on geological and geochemical data obtained by the Institute of Geology and Seismology of the Academy of Sciences of Moldova and the State Geological Agency in Moldova (for short AGeoM), the territory from the central basin of the river Dniester is considered promising in terms of detection of mineralization of radioactive elements, rare metals, iron, zinc, lead, barite, including REE. Concentrations of REE (TR), represented by lanthanum (La), cerium (Ce), ytterbium (Yb), yttrium (Y) and scandium (Sc) were found in terrigenous formations in north-eastern Republic of Moldova.
U.S.A.
United States of America, which were once world leader in the production of REE, exploited until 2002 a deposit in Mountain Pass, California. Mountain Pass mine does not contain significant amounts of dysprosium, vital element for the so-called permanent magnets, used in the manufacture of many essential components of the American defense system.
In April 2010, in the American Congress it was urgently discussed a report on the vital role of REE for the American economy. On the website of U.S.A. Congress, it could be read then that „REE are essential to developing technologies that produce renewable energies; these technologies allow U.S.A. to reduce their dependence on oil and reduce emissions of greenhouse gas. Chinese will is to limit its exports in this direction and thus to make an issue of U.S.A. competitiveness, and we must, on the one hand to ensure supplies and, on the other hand, allow the development of mines to extract REE from American subsoil. U.S.A. cannot depend 100 percent on imports from China.
„The American administration in Washington wanted a law to encourage exports of REE in U.S.A., somewhat delayed after the reaction of China to establish the embargo on its REE.
Given the lack of American production of REE, U.S.A. was forced to buy these strategic raw materials from China, the source of about 90 percent of these minerals, thereby setting market prices. Therefore, the Americans decided that a priority for American industry to seek such rare mineral deposits, so that U.S.A. be released by the „Chinese dependency”.
Report of April 2010, presented in the U.S.A. Congress, was conducted by U.S. General Accountability Office estimated that they will have to pass about 15 years before U.S.A. be able to rebuild its own industry of rare elements – and this if it can be resolved a number of legal, technical and financial issues. In its turn, Pentagon issued a report about the military vulnerability of U.S.A. in this case. U.S.A. Energy Department is working on its own plan, and House Armed Services Committee has scheduled a hearing on the subject.
In April 2011, Molycorp Minerals, an American company established in Colorado, has made known a plan of 500 million dollars U.SA. for the renovation of the Mountain Pass mine in the Mojave Desert (California. U.S.A.) which, prior to its closure in 2002 due to Chinese competition in domain and environmental concerns (use of solvents for the extraction of REE). Molycorp Minerals was the leading producer of REE.
U.S.A. decided also to create a stockpile of REE, as did Japan and South Korea. After a complete technical rehabilitation by returning to compliance with the current norms of pollution, Mountain Pass mine was reopened again in 2012.
[1] Asociația Oamenilor de Știință din România
[2] „The maps were made long ago, the places were known, but the development of mining was non-existent in the 30-35 years of continuous wars,” says Ahmad Hujabre, an Afghan engineer who worked in ’79 in the Ministry of Mines in Afghanistan, mention made public on the website www.7126569-comoara-din-afganistan-adevaratul-motiv-al-invazieiamericane_files/index_white_980.htm, visited on September 11, 2010
Armed with the old Russian charts, the U.S. Geological Survey began performing since 2006, a number of overflights in height on Afghanistan. American scholars have used the latest equipment, based on magnetic and gravity measurements. The equipment was mounted on an aircraft type Navy Orion P-3 who flew over thus 70 percent of the country surface. The data obtained were so optimistic for Washington that, in 2007, the team of geologists returned for an even more sophisticated study, this time aboard of a British bomber aircraft, equipped with instruments that offered threedimensional images of mineral deposits of small and big depth. It was the most detailed and advanced study on Afghan basement ever made. The results were – apparently – forgotten, because in November 2009, a special force, delegated by Pentagon with the mission to find the final data on Afghan wealth set up immediately in “the theatre of operations against terrorism”.
By 2010, according to Pentagon data, the largest natural deposits investigated include major deposits of iron and copper. Deposits are so large that situates, theoretically, Afghanistan on the top of the states with the largest reserves of copper and iron in the world. Other finds include large deposits of niobium, a light metal, very rare, used in producing steels with superconducting properties.
Afghanistan’s natural gas reserves contain approximately 150 billion cubic meters. Coal deposits in this country sums up also the enormous turnover of over 400 million tons.
In 1983, in Khwaja Rawash Mountains, situated at north of Kabul, Soviet experts have identified one of the largest uranium deposits in the world. In 2009, Americans discovered further that Afghanistan also holds similar deposits of uranium in Koh Mir Daoud near Herat and Kharkiz, in Khandahar province.
More, Afghanistan also holds important deposits of natural asbestos, gold, silver, nickel, zinc, mercury, bauxite, potassium, graphite, tourmaline, emeralds, sapphires and rubies. Afghanistan’s gold deposits are also not modest; some experts estimate that if it moves to exploit all the gold eposits in Afghanistan, the world market of gold will fall by over 50 percent in the first month of operation!!! (sic!)
But the great wealth of the Afghan subsoil consists in iron deposits with an unprecedented purity. At first estimation, the ferrous deposits contain about 2 billion tons of mixed hematite and magnetite, mixtures containing about 62 percent pure iron. The largest copper deposit in Afghanistan is 50 km north of the capital Kabul, in Aynak valley. The deposits contain over 300 million tons of ore with a copper purity of 0.7-1.5 percent.
About 80 percent of the world reserves of lapis-lazuli, a semi-precious stone, are yet untapped, being hidden in the Afghan basement. Before the Soviet invasion in 1979, Afghan miners extract annually about 6,000 tons of lapislazuli, a tiny amount compared to the bulk of deposits.
Notes
[3] ***, Comoara din Afganistan – adevăratul motiv al invaziei americane?, on the website www.mozilla.firefox.ro, visited on September 16, 2010
[4] quote Mihaela Stoica, Americanii au făcut o descoperire uriaşă în Afganistan: minereuri în valoare de circa un trilion de dolari, in Adevărul, June 14, 2010
[5] on the website http://www.ditadifulmine.com/2010/06/scoperti-enormigiacimenti-di-minerali.html, visited in June 24, 2010
[6] after Clara Delpas, Bolivie: le lithium se fait attendre, on the website www.novethic.com, visited in December 7, 2010
[7] Rebecca Hollender and Jim Shultz, Bolivia and its Lithium. Can the “Gold of the 21st Century” Help Lift a Nation out of Poverty? À Democracy Center Special Report, on the website http://democracyctr.org/pdf/DClithiumfullreportenglish.pdf, visited in May 9, 2010
[8] on the website http://www.litiobolivia.org/en.html, visited in May 10, 2011
[9] press release prepared by Marie-José Girard, M.Sc. Géo., a qualified person under the Norm 43-101, Exploration Dios Inc., Marie-José Girard, president and CEO, e-mail:. mjgirard@diosexplo.com, on the website www.diosexplo.com, visited in October 1, 2010, at 12:29
[10] according to Iuliu Pop, Magnetismul pământurilor rare, Bucharest, Academy Publishing House, 1968 and Милованов, Г.Н., Черносвитов, Ю.Л., Редкоземельные элементы, Госгеолтехиздат, Москва, 1959, quoted by Popuiac A., Aspecte generale din geochimia pământurilor rare din nord-estul Republicii Moldova, in the Bulletin of the Institute of Geology and Seismology of the Academy of Sciences of Moldova, no. 1, 2009, p. 29-40
[11] A. Popuiac, Aspecte generale din geochimia pământurilor rare din nord-estul Republicii Moldova, in the Bulletin of the Institute of Geology and Seismology of the Academy of Sciences of Moldova, no. 1, 2009, p. 29-40
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