No. of Recommendations: 20
"All of which makes China's near-total domination of the rare earth market a matter of economic and national security concern."
Here I go again. The US gave Mountain Pass, CA money to develop their rare earth mine and refinery. There really weren't enough of the varied rare earths to really help, the refining tech was questionable, and ultimately didn't work, so they ship to China for refining. Great independence. The US got took by a con, but everyone involved liked it.
Lynas couldn't get set up completely in Australia because all of the refinery builders had contracts occupying them. So they set up in Malaysia - big mistake - Malaysia's greens ignored the advancements and ran an anti thorium radiation campaign of mutated animals and babies. The concentrated ore was shipped to Malaysia and for a year was operated by an incompetent French CEO. He was fired, Amanda Lacaz took over, smoothed out operations and got the process down pat. When China lowered RE prices to bankrupt outside of China refineries, Lynas remained profitable. lYNAS survived the price downward manipulation. Now Lynas is poised to start separating heavy rare earths in June, and will be the first to do so. Lynas built another plant in Calgary ( haven't followed this one) and is part owner of another processing plant in Texas ( haven't followed this one either).
Lynas has the tech know how and IP on processing. They've lived it, survived political storms, Chinese price manipulation, and are now expanding operations. Australia is a friendly if T doesn't go complete asshat on them. MAGA - get T off of our allies backs. We need our allies - give T a wake up call. No one minded NATO getting a kick but turn around and work with them now - it's the smartest thing to do. Putin is no help, we know you like persecuting gays, etc., but it ain't helping. That is all.
