New York Times Chinese Website wrote today (October 22): "Can US-Australia cooperation shake China's control over rare earths? Australia has abundant resource reserves and a mature industrial system, while the United States hopes to seek mineral sources outside of China. The cooperation between the two countries may change the global rare earth trade pattern, but building mines, oil refineries, and factories may take several years."
[Cunning] Comment: Can the US and Australia challenge China's control over rare earths? Let's calculate this "aluminum account" first! To separate 100 tons of gallium, it requires about 7.5 million tons of aluminum electrolysis capacity. What does this mean? It is more than three times the annual production of the US Aluminum industry! After all, the US Aluminum industry is expected to produce 2.3 million to 2.5 million tons of aluminum in 2025, which is far less than the demand for 100 tons of gallium. More astonishingly, the 7.5 million tons of aluminum electrolysis behind it involves 15 million tons of investment in alumina plants (about 150 billion yuan), consumes 100 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity annually (approximately equal to the annual power generation of the Three Gorges Dam), and requires power support equivalent to 10 nuclear power plants or 50 million square meters of photovoltaic panels. However, the US Aluminum industry itself is already struggling with its own capacity, so how can it talk about "replacing China"? This isn't cooperation; it's clearly overreaching. China has been deeply involved in the rare earth field for many years, with technical, industrial chain, and scale advantages that are evident. For the US and Australia to rely on such meager resources to turn around, they might not even get the "ticket to enter".
Original: www.toutiao.com/article/1846656327600328/
Statement: This article represents the views of the author.