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| Science & Technology |
| Inside China's secret toxic unobtainium mine (Green tech's dirty little secrets) |
| 2010-01-13 |
| Ok...I'll bite: Maybe this is why the Chicoms hate Rantburg Last week it was reported that China - which has a global monopoly on the production of rare-earth metals - is now threatening to cut off vital supplies to the West. A shortage would jeopardise the manufacturing and development of green technologies such as wind turbines and low-energy lightbulbs. RICHARD JONES is the first Western journalist to visit the rare-earth mines in Inner Mongolia to discover why China is unwilling to give up its precious elements... It looks like a scene from an apocalyptic science-fiction movie. High on the frozen plains of Inner Mongolia, giant trucks rumble across the floor of a lunar-like crater so vast that it looks as if it might have been gouged out by a meteorite. As we peer down at the eerie spectacle from the crater's edge, a security guard behind us barks out in Mandarin: 'Explosives! Move away!' Seconds later, a deafening crack rings out and part of a 660ft high rock face is brought crashing down. When the dust settles, 170-ton dumper trucks close in to scoop up the rocks. They are taken to refineries where rare-earth metals - known in the mining industry as 'unobtainiums' because they are so scarce - will be extracted using boiling acid and other toxic chemicals. This two-mile-wide crater in one of the most remote corners of China is the secretive Baiyun Obo mine. It's the world's biggest mine and the largest single source of rare-earths, the metallic elements that are driving the global revolution in green technology. The rare-earths blasted out of rocks here feed more than 77 per cent of global demand for elements such as terbium, which power low-energy lightbulbs; neodymium, which powers wind turbines; and lanthanum, which powers the batteries of hybrid cars such as the Toyota Prius. They are also used in mobile phones, computers, iPods, LCD screens, washing machines, digital cameras and X-ray machines, as well as missile guidance systems and even space rockets. Industries reliant on the rare-earths are estimated to be worth an astonishing £3trillion, or five per cent of global GDP. I was the first Western journalist to set foot inside the mine. What I saw at Baiyun Obo and the poisoned refineries it feeds raises disturbing questions about the future we are buying into - and who will control it. A brave worker agreed to smuggle me past tight security and the police patrolling the perimeter in four-wheel-drive vehicles to show me around the site which is run by the state-controlled Inner Mongolia Baotou Steel Rare-Earth Hi-Tech Company. On the crater floor, Terex dumper trucks, the largest in China, towered over us as they shifted 168 tons of rare-earth rock. It's a 24-hour-a-day operation. Front line: A worker's clothes are peppered with holes burned by the acid used by refineries to extract the rare-earths from the rocks. The rocks are full of rare-earth metals combined with iron ore, and the rare-earths are extracted as a supplementary process to the iron-ore extraction, making it the most productive source of rare-earths on the planet. It is a source upon which the Western world has become dependent. In 2008, China supplied 139,000 tons worldwide, 97 per cent of the world's total rare-earth production. The architect of modern China, Deng Xiaoping, realised the significance of the elements lurking in the arid wastes of Inner Mongolia almost 20 years ago when he said: 'There is oil in the Middle East but there is rare-earth in China.' His pride is shared by mine worker Shang Liqing, who drove me to a vantage point overlooking the huge main mine. 'This isn't just the rare-earth home town of China but of the entire world,' he said. more at the link |
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| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2010-01-13 23:58 |
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