In a way this is good news. The more China overplays its hand in this undeclared economic war the more likely that Western countries will realize that they are making the exact same mistake with China that they have made with Russia. You can't play nice with dictatorships in the hope that your long term economic interests will be aligned to the point that the other party will be forced to continue to play nice. China has been playing the long game successfully so far, these kind of mistakes are good indicators of what's really going on underneath all that.
Just for a moment consider what it would mean if China arbitrarily stopped exporting consumer electronics or any other category of product and what the effect on the West would be. We really should pull back some of that manufacturing and deal with the resulting pollution closer to where the goods are consumed. And while we're at it we may be able to improve the quality a bit as well.
The reason why the US doesn't like China is because the US dislikes the idea of being the #2 economy and losing control. The US has absolutely no "morals" so to say and is allied with/provides literal military support to about 70% of dictatorships[1]. The US simply acts out of national interests, not morals. History proves this. I'm baffled by how many Americans repeat state propaganda points.
Most people don't want to try and make things, so they are unaware how incredibly f we are.
Like I have little project and needed an enclosure made to order. Nothing fancy. Tried three rather known Western vendors and none could manufacture it to an acceptable standard. It was also very expensive and customer service seemed annoyed that I even want to order anything. I lost a lot of money on this, simply because I didn't want to support China.
Unfortunately had to hold my nose and go with Chinese. It's a night and day difference. Customer service was helpful and guided me through everything - and the quality. Damn. All dimensions exactly on point, no gaps, no off angles, no chipped paint, just perfect. The price was very similar to what I paid to more expensive Western company, but the value for money - no comparison.
It's even worse with PCBs. There is one company in Europe that I could recommend, but they are rather expensive and I wouldn't use it for larger quantity - the cost of the end product would mean you wouldn't be able to compete.
So it's China again. Amazing customer service, advanced options, short lead times.
I am less convinced that China is really good at playing the long game, and more convinced that China is subject to many of the same political struggles that we see in the US. It’s just so easy to tap into our fears of China that we want to believe that they’re this smart and ruthless. We look for evidence to validate our feelings.
There are deposits of these rare earth minerals elsewhere. There are always more deposits, it’s just that they’re untapped until we deplete our cheaper sources. If China withholds its minerals, we will use more expensive sources, but we will still get the minerals.
> You can't play nice with dictatorships in the hope that your long term economic interests will be aligned to the point that the other party will be forced to continue to play nice.
This is a false equivalence of democracy = partner. The US has been happy to trade with friendly dictatorships (e.g. Saudi Arabia) and has itself threatened, overthrown, or interefered in democratic and popular governments (e.g. Chile) that didn't align with its interests.
But China hasn't from the Huawei bans to the latest semiconductor blockade and I don't think they will do it here.
What China appears to be doing is to double down on investment in sanctioned sectors while keeping trade open. And I think they continue this strategy.
> The more China overplays its hand in this undeclared economic war
This arrogant bigotry hurts, we (not only the US but the collective west) have shown everybody how to play this game, and were also not the first. Further, if a country puts up general taxes or protects it resources against all others's the same isn't it its good right? Hate the word war is used so easily, especially in the US, the term economic war fits more most of the uneffective and also wrong sanctions imo.
the reality distortion is pretty astonishing. This is clearly retaliation for the American policy of containment. The US for several years has now openly made it its goal to try to strangle Chinese technological development, most importantly in the chips sector. It's actually surprising how little response up until now came out of China.
In the world overall nobody actually perceives this as China overplaying its hand, but as a consequence of the US weaponizing trade, and the result all over the world economy will be a shift away from the US with the exception of its core military allies. The shift is already obvious in the Middle East and Africa. France(!) just settled an LNG trade with China in Yuan for the first time[1].
The American behavior is bad for everyone. The US will lose its pretty comfortable position in global trade due to the prominence of the dollar, everyone else is simply hurt by the economic fallout of trade wars.
"Just for a moment consider what it would mean if China arbitrarily stopped exporting consumer electronics or any other category of product and what the effect on the West would be."
The economy of the west would be devastated, but so would very likely be the economy of china itself. It sounds a bit to me like the concept of nuclear war, mutual assured destruction, so no one does it.
Totalitarian country should not be rewarded and supply chain should have at least a total ban option. Look at Russia and look at Taiwan, not to mention Hong Kong.
The west has come to the same realization with the US as well, though it's been a slow burn.
It's not the dictatorship that makes china a problem needing the trade wars, it's power, and countries with power operate outside of the rules based systems. Countries who don't submit to the rules based order shouldn't benefit from it
> We really should pull back some of that manufacturing and deal with the resulting pollution closer to where the goods are consumed
Or, you know, not do anything? I genuinely find it laughable that people are advocating all of this China hate because they're a dictatorship. So are the Gulf nations, I don't see anyone advocating for cutting them off. Also from a global point of view, U.S. foreign policy has caused way more harm to the world than the Chinese so it is bizarre for the U.S. to champion itself as a savior of the oppressed. I genuinely think Americans should stop drinking the Kool aid of their government being the good guy.
"China is estimated to hold an about 84% share of the global market in neodymium magnets and an over 90% interest in samarium cobalt magnets. Japan, meanwhile, has about 15% of the neodymium magnet market and a less-than-10% share of that for samarium cobalt.
If China bans the export of such technologies, it would be difficult for the United States and Europe, which do not traditionally manufacture rare earth magnets, to newly enter the market, thus making those countries totally dependent on China, according to a European source.
Beijing has been investing in facilities to manufacture magnets at low cost through large-scale production, which could lead to Japan losing its market share in the future.
The draft revision says the export ban and restrictions are aimed at protecting “national security” and are in the “public interest of society.” Chinese President Xi Jinping’s administration has positioned magnets as a key factor in China’s economic growth and security."
This is not normal decoupling, we're in a full on economic war.
This is not normal decoupling, we're in a full on economic war.
In the short term that's terrible. In the long term, pain now will help minimize pain later when China invade Taiwan and US-China trade drops to zero overnight. It's coming sooner or later and the longer you leave your investments in China the more you risk the door slamming shut on your hand.
We've been in Cold War 2 for a while. It's hard to see the other two options as better alternatives. (hot war & capitulation)
The West learned a lot during the first cold war and will outlast. Authoritarianism has a problem with corruption and not telling the leader the truth of reality.
plenty of people have been warning about this for years with regards to the push towards renewable energy and electric cars. China makes 70-80% of the components of solar panels globally.
the idea that manufacturing is somehow low value and "services" are what developed economies should focus on is one of the dumbest concepts in human history. It will take the US decades to rebuild their manufacturing base
China has been dumping rare earth metals and magnets at ridiculously low prices for decades (and polluting their country). This had the effect of making mining and refining these metals unprofitable in the west (why pay the huge price of pollution when the Chinese will contaminate their ground water below costs?).
This doesn't mean the west can't scale up prospection and innovation to have cleaner ways to make these magnets. There's little to no tech gap the Chinese have over the west.
US bans technology exports for certain things too. Try and export a reactor design. Recently, we are seeing more investment in semiconductor manufacturing and other electronic away from China. China is not just going to sit back if they have an opportunity to secure their position in this industry. This action shouldn't be surprising. Expect more attempts at protectionism as different industries attempt to diversify manufacturing out of China, not China to just well up and take the massive economic hit that this would mean for them.
I'm trying to find out if the rare earth extraction plant that MP Minerals was building in Alliance, TX actually got built.[1] Google and Bing pictures are from 2021 and show a vacant lot.
If anyone is near there, please go to the corner of Independence and Victory and see how the construction is going.
PR: "MP Materials broke ground for its magnet factory at Alliance last April, and completed the building’s shell in September. ... The company plans to start delivering alloy from the Fort Worth plant to General Motors late this year, and magnets in 2025, MP Materials founder James Litinsky said in an annual profit report meeting."
MP Minerals already has the largest rare earth mine in the US, at Mountain Pass, CA. That went bankrupt in 2015 because of low-priced competition from China. They finally got a process working that didn't cause major pollution problems.
That mine has been back in action since 2018. They only do initial separation at the mine; the ore is shipped to China for further processing until the US plant gets going.
China had a near-monopoly in rare-earths processing. Had. About six weeks ago, MP Minerals made a deal with Sumitomo in Japan to provide ore for to be processed into rare earths in Japan.[3][4]
There's also some company called US Rare Earths, with a mine in Colorado. Their PR shows lots of funding and announcing, not so much manufacturing and shipping.
China has been making rare-earth metal threats for years. The main result is that China's share of rare earth mining has dropped from 80% to about 55% as the US and Australia ramp up.[2] Also that the industry has become very profitable. MP Minerals profit more than doubled last year. 10-20 years ago, everybody in this space was going bust.
I read "Rare Earths" are nor really rare. But the article did say extracting these elements cheaply causes a lot of environmental damage, which as we know, China is perfectly fine with.
I also read the US is close to opening a "mining" site for Rear Earths, but not sure where or for what elements.
They are rare in the sense that they tend to be extremely diffuse, rather than having nice, massive veins of concentrated ore or elemental metal like you might find for copper or bauxite.
Since they tend to be diffuse, mining them requires disrupting significant volumes of earth and rock, plus the chemicals needed to separate them out of the less interesting material that gets dug up.
The cheapest way to do that is to strip mine large tracts of land and not reclaim or treat any water used in the process, which will likely be full of heavy metals and other chemicals.
If we don't like how other countries do it, we have to be willing to do it ourselves, which means years delayed supply chains (basically every mine in the US is protested and delayed through the legal system) and higher prices for the refined materials (it costs more to do it right).
The US has always had rare earth mines, but competition from low cost producers in China makes them economically unviable (and the US is market based, among other things). There is plenty of supply in developed countries, but being undercut by other producers require government subsidies or a more closed market to be viable.
If China refuses to export this stuff themselves, it actually makes these mines more economically viable. However, if they export the end products, they could still have problems.
I think it's important in the context of this discussion to separate the mining of rare earths and the processing thereof. Both are generally environmentally hazardous, but in different ways. The mining process generally involves strip mines or open pit mines (such as Mountain Pass in California, iirc the only US rare earth mine), neither of which are particularly friendly to the environment. The processing is also hazardous due to the chemicals and processes necessary to separate the component elements of the ores which are effectively more tightly coupled than is the case in most metal mines. Domestically that means continued and heightened investment in Mountain Pass as well as potentially other sites, but also the development of domestic processing industry. So while the mine might be in California we're going to see the ancillary industry popping up in locations with notably lower standards, i.e. Texas.
I think another issue is that a lot of the various rare earths(maybe just the lanthanides?) are chemically similar and thus very difficult to isolate. In the end, a lot of this just boils down to establishing the production networks which takes time and a lot of money.
Not clear from the article or the comments here whether the proposed ban is on the magnets themselves or the technology to manufacture the magnets. The words read both ways. Anyone has seen/has insight into the original proposal in Chinese?
This issue has been a long time coming and China has warned us about it at least 10 years ago (probably longer). We used to have a mine in California called Mountain pass mine, but it had a toxic spill in the early 00's and never reopened due to Chinese competition.
Export controls on manufacturing tech not materials, which I don't imagine is particularly enforcable. Will just get transhipped through middlemen, but I can imagine increasing price astronomically for competitive advantage.
I am going to bet that Xi is severely overplaying his hand.
They need to provide 1 billion people. I remember even an outbreak over porkmeat (1 disease) and milk powder was a national emergency. There's even a whole army of fishing boats...
China is not self reliant on food and if a war would break out, China is going to be in scrambles pretty fast.
Sure, They can contain protests in a region of China, but not across the country.
Unfortunately, i think we'll have to find out sooner or later.
Aren't the materials to make rare-earth magnets... not actually that rare? It's only rare in the sense of their dispersal in the earth's crust, this making it a rather dirty and ecologically disruptive activity sourcing them. The US could theoretically start producing rare-earth metals, couldn't they?
I have a feeling that this move would just accelerate the adoption of the newer high temperature superconductor magnets (of the sort that have recently been upending fusion reactor designs).
China long-term strategizes while the US often twiddles its thumbs and belatedly responds (it's waking up with the export controls on chip manufacturing tech, but it should have done that a decade ago).
Man, they must have discovered some weird defense industry application and this will be the first remembered clue that future me had that the worldwide shit was hitting the fan.?
[+] [-] jacquesm|2 years ago|reply
Just for a moment consider what it would mean if China arbitrarily stopped exporting consumer electronics or any other category of product and what the effect on the West would be. We really should pull back some of that manufacturing and deal with the resulting pollution closer to where the goods are consumed. And while we're at it we may be able to improve the quality a bit as well.
[+] [-] snehk|2 years ago|reply
[1] https://truthout.org/articles/us-provides-military-assistanc...
[+] [-] varispeed|2 years ago|reply
Like I have little project and needed an enclosure made to order. Nothing fancy. Tried three rather known Western vendors and none could manufacture it to an acceptable standard. It was also very expensive and customer service seemed annoyed that I even want to order anything. I lost a lot of money on this, simply because I didn't want to support China.
Unfortunately had to hold my nose and go with Chinese. It's a night and day difference. Customer service was helpful and guided me through everything - and the quality. Damn. All dimensions exactly on point, no gaps, no off angles, no chipped paint, just perfect. The price was very similar to what I paid to more expensive Western company, but the value for money - no comparison.
It's even worse with PCBs. There is one company in Europe that I could recommend, but they are rather expensive and I wouldn't use it for larger quantity - the cost of the end product would mean you wouldn't be able to compete.
So it's China again. Amazing customer service, advanced options, short lead times.
We are so f.
[+] [-] klodolph|2 years ago|reply
There are deposits of these rare earth minerals elsewhere. There are always more deposits, it’s just that they’re untapped until we deplete our cheaper sources. If China withholds its minerals, we will use more expensive sources, but we will still get the minerals.
[+] [-] ramblenode|2 years ago|reply
This is a false equivalence of democracy = partner. The US has been happy to trade with friendly dictatorships (e.g. Saudi Arabia) and has itself threatened, overthrown, or interefered in democratic and popular governments (e.g. Chile) that didn't align with its interests.
[+] [-] throwaway4good|2 years ago|reply
But China hasn't from the Huawei bans to the latest semiconductor blockade and I don't think they will do it here.
What China appears to be doing is to double down on investment in sanctioned sectors while keeping trade open. And I think they continue this strategy.
[+] [-] throwbadubadu|2 years ago|reply
This arrogant bigotry hurts, we (not only the US but the collective west) have shown everybody how to play this game, and were also not the first. Further, if a country puts up general taxes or protects it resources against all others's the same isn't it its good right? Hate the word war is used so easily, especially in the US, the term economic war fits more most of the uneffective and also wrong sanctions imo.
[+] [-] virtualritz|2 years ago|reply
The motivations for dictatorships and democracies to behave one way or another are ultimately governed by the same principles & constraints[1].
[1] https://youtu.be/rStL7niR7gs
[+] [-] Barrin92|2 years ago|reply
In the world overall nobody actually perceives this as China overplaying its hand, but as a consequence of the US weaponizing trade, and the result all over the world economy will be a shift away from the US with the exception of its core military allies. The shift is already obvious in the Middle East and Africa. France(!) just settled an LNG trade with China in Yuan for the first time[1].
The American behavior is bad for everyone. The US will lose its pretty comfortable position in global trade due to the prominence of the dollar, everyone else is simply hurt by the economic fallout of trade wars.
[1]https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/china-completes-first-yuan-s...
[+] [-] hutzlibu|2 years ago|reply
The economy of the west would be devastated, but so would very likely be the economy of china itself. It sounds a bit to me like the concept of nuclear war, mutual assured destruction, so no one does it.
[+] [-] SergeAx|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ngcc_hk|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lakomen|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 8note|2 years ago|reply
It's not the dictatorship that makes china a problem needing the trade wars, it's power, and countries with power operate outside of the rules based systems. Countries who don't submit to the rules based order shouldn't benefit from it
[+] [-] curiousgal|2 years ago|reply
Or, you know, not do anything? I genuinely find it laughable that people are advocating all of this China hate because they're a dictatorship. So are the Gulf nations, I don't see anyone advocating for cutting them off. Also from a global point of view, U.S. foreign policy has caused way more harm to the world than the Chinese so it is bizarre for the U.S. to champion itself as a savior of the oppressed. I genuinely think Americans should stop drinking the Kool aid of their government being the good guy.
[+] [-] moose_man|2 years ago|reply
If China bans the export of such technologies, it would be difficult for the United States and Europe, which do not traditionally manufacture rare earth magnets, to newly enter the market, thus making those countries totally dependent on China, according to a European source.
Beijing has been investing in facilities to manufacture magnets at low cost through large-scale production, which could lead to Japan losing its market share in the future.
The draft revision says the export ban and restrictions are aimed at protecting “national security” and are in the “public interest of society.” Chinese President Xi Jinping’s administration has positioned magnets as a key factor in China’s economic growth and security."
This is not normal decoupling, we're in a full on economic war.
[+] [-] causi|2 years ago|reply
In the short term that's terrible. In the long term, pain now will help minimize pain later when China invade Taiwan and US-China trade drops to zero overnight. It's coming sooner or later and the longer you leave your investments in China the more you risk the door slamming shut on your hand.
[+] [-] downrightmike|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] verdverm|2 years ago|reply
The West learned a lot during the first cold war and will outlast. Authoritarianism has a problem with corruption and not telling the leader the truth of reality.
[+] [-] ren_engineer|2 years ago|reply
the idea that manufacturing is somehow low value and "services" are what developed economies should focus on is one of the dumbest concepts in human history. It will take the US decades to rebuild their manufacturing base
[+] [-] 908B64B197|2 years ago|reply
China has been dumping rare earth metals and magnets at ridiculously low prices for decades (and polluting their country). This had the effect of making mining and refining these metals unprofitable in the west (why pay the huge price of pollution when the Chinese will contaminate their ground water below costs?).
This doesn't mean the west can't scale up prospection and innovation to have cleaner ways to make these magnets. There's little to no tech gap the Chinese have over the west.
[+] [-] f6v|2 years ago|reply
I can see this as a response to USA banning China from accessing top chip technologies.
[+] [-] asdff|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Animats|2 years ago|reply
PR: "MP Materials broke ground for its magnet factory at Alliance last April, and completed the building’s shell in September. ... The company plans to start delivering alloy from the Fort Worth plant to General Motors late this year, and magnets in 2025, MP Materials founder James Litinsky said in an annual profit report meeting."
MP Minerals already has the largest rare earth mine in the US, at Mountain Pass, CA. That went bankrupt in 2015 because of low-priced competition from China. They finally got a process working that didn't cause major pollution problems.
That mine has been back in action since 2018. They only do initial separation at the mine; the ore is shipped to China for further processing until the US plant gets going.
China had a near-monopoly in rare-earths processing. Had. About six weeks ago, MP Minerals made a deal with Sumitomo in Japan to provide ore for to be processed into rare earths in Japan.[3][4]
There's also some company called US Rare Earths, with a mine in Colorado. Their PR shows lots of funding and announcing, not so much manufacturing and shipping.
China has been making rare-earth metal threats for years. The main result is that China's share of rare earth mining has dropped from 80% to about 55% as the US and Australia ramp up.[2] Also that the industry has become very profitable. MP Minerals profit more than doubled last year. 10-20 years ago, everybody in this space was going bust.
[1] https://mpmaterials.com/articles/mp-materials-begins-constru...
[2] https://www.mining-technology.com/features/australia-rare-ea...
[3] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/02/22/business/us-rar...
[4] https://www.pm-review.com/mp-materials-and-sumitomo-corporat...
[+] [-] petilon|2 years ago|reply
But it will take 10 to 15 years to process it.
[+] [-] jmclnx|2 years ago|reply
I also read the US is close to opening a "mining" site for Rear Earths, but not sure where or for what elements.
[+] [-] zdragnar|2 years ago|reply
Since they tend to be diffuse, mining them requires disrupting significant volumes of earth and rock, plus the chemicals needed to separate them out of the less interesting material that gets dug up.
The cheapest way to do that is to strip mine large tracts of land and not reclaim or treat any water used in the process, which will likely be full of heavy metals and other chemicals.
If we don't like how other countries do it, we have to be willing to do it ourselves, which means years delayed supply chains (basically every mine in the US is protested and delayed through the legal system) and higher prices for the refined materials (it costs more to do it right).
[+] [-] seanmcdirmid|2 years ago|reply
If China refuses to export this stuff themselves, it actually makes these mines more economically viable. However, if they export the end products, they could still have problems.
[+] [-] sohex|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] robocat|2 years ago|reply
“China has outsourced much of its rare earth mining industry to Myanmar’s Kachin state” https://news.mongabay.com/2022/08/toxic-rare-earth-mines-fue... (maybe overstated, but definitely a real issue).
[+] [-] bbojan|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] barelysapient|2 years ago|reply
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Pass_mine#:~:text=The....
[+] [-] 01100011|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nonethewiser|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] phoenixreader|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sfifs|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gscott|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] KyleBerezin|2 years ago|reply
There were plans to reactivate the mine, and it looks like it is now producing more than 12% of the worlds production (https://pubs.usgs.gov/periodicals/mcs2021/mcs2021-rare-earth...)
[+] [-] dirtyid|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] waterheater|2 years ago|reply
https://www.polymagnet.com/
[+] [-] NicoJuicy|2 years ago|reply
They need to provide 1 billion people. I remember even an outbreak over porkmeat (1 disease) and milk powder was a national emergency. There's even a whole army of fishing boats...
China is not self reliant on food and if a war would break out, China is going to be in scrambles pretty fast.
Sure, They can contain protests in a region of China, but not across the country.
Unfortunately, i think we'll have to find out sooner or later.
[+] [-] agentultra|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] webmaven|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hunglee2|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] insane_dreamer|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] russiasux|2 years ago|reply
Man, they must have discovered some weird defense industry application and this will be the first remembered clue that future me had that the worldwide shit was hitting the fan.?
[+] [-] navigate8310|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] animitronix|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mattparcens|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stevespang|2 years ago|reply
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