From the Daily Caller
Nick Pope
Contributor
China is planning to restrict exports of a key mineral needed to make weapons, energy experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation, while a U.S. company that could reduce U.S. dependence on foreign suppliers is mired in red tape.
According to the center, the Chinese government announced on August 15 that it would restrict exports of antimony, an important mineral that dominates global weapons production and is essential for the production of ammunition, night vision goggles, and ammunition that are critical to national security. Equipment such as bullets is vital. Energy experts say U.S. miner Perpetua Resources has been wrangling red tape for years to develop a mine in Valley County, Idaho, that could reduce its reliance on Chinese antimony supplies, but a slow permitting process has hampered the process. DCNF.
Developing a mine like the one Perpetua Resources is trying to operate can take years to get all the necessary approvals and permits. One of the key permitting laws in place is the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), which also applies to federal land management actions and the construction of certain public infrastructure projects, such as highways.
“After six years of planning and early involvement, we started [NEPA] A spokesman for Perpetua Resources told DCNF, “We will complete the permitting process in 2016. We are now eight years into NEPA.” The company hopes to extract antimony from the largest known deposit in the United States, as well as the development of Perpetua Resources Millions of ounces of gold can also be produced.
Diana Furchtgott-Roth, director of the Center for Energy, Climate and the Environment at the Heritage Foundation, believes the Perpetua Resources mine raises real environmental concerns that should be addressed, but that U.S. production is almost certainly higher than China's Cleaner. In addition, Fuchgot-Ross said reliance on China to produce raw materials needed for critical defense equipment poses clear national security risks.
“The mines and other things in the United States have some of the highest environmental standards in the world,” Fuchgot-Ross told DCNF. “This is a huge national security risk. Given that we saw Russia cut off gas supplies to Europe, we know that countries can cut off vital supplies to other countries.
“If the government wants to pursue policies that promote electric vehicles, green energy and other mineral-intensive technologies, it should simplify the permitting process across the board, rather than selectively reforming certain favored types of development over others. Make reforms. (Related: 'Making their lives extremely miserable': Top US commander outlines 'hellscape' response if China invades Taiwan)
Steve Coonen, a former Defense Department official who focused on technology exports to China, also believes that relying on China to provide the raw materials needed to produce critical technologies poses obvious national security risks.
“The United States has all the rare earth elements it needs, not much different from its energy needs,” Kunin told DCNF. “Yet Democrats are shackling American industry by banning the mining of these materials for misguided and ill-informed ecological reasons, posing significant risks to national security and the long-term economic health of the United States.”
According to CSIS data, China accounts for nearly 50% of global antimony production and is also the source of 63% of the current antimony imports into the United States. At the same time, according to CNBC, the United States did not mine any “saleable” antimony in 2023.
According to CNBC, China’s recently announced antimony export restrictions will take effect on September 15. Lewis Black, CEO of Canadian Mining Corporation, said that for many in the industry, China's move to restrict antimony exports just a few months ago was surprising, so the country's decision to act “is quite significant in that regard.” Confrontational,” Almonte Industries told the outlet.
In addition to antimony, China has also shown strength since 2023 by restricting exports of other key minerals in which it dominates globally, such as germanium and gallium.
“The United States is proud to have the highest permitting standards in the world. But NEPA has been criticized for being inefficient, and much of that criticism is justified,” a Perpetua Resources spokesperson told DCNF. “When we talk about minerals needed for America’s national and economic security—not to mention our clean energy future—we need an effective regulatory process that still provides strong protections for communities and the environment.”
A Perpetua Resources spokesperson told DCNF that the company expects the process from initial identification of the deposit to the start of extraction of minerals from the site to take 18 years. However, the spokesperson added that NEPA promotes public transparency and allows the stakeholder community to participate in discussions about the plan.
Nonetheless, Perpetua Resources “absolutely supports a common-sense, bipartisan approach to allowing reform” because “good projects should not languish in red tape.”
Antimony restrictions may be even more urgent given concerns about the strength of the U.S. defense industrial base amid wars in the Middle East and Europe, as well as growing tensions with China over Taiwan. Many experts warn that the United States is allowing itself to become too dependent on a hostile China for mineral supplies that play a larger role in the U.S. economy, thanks in part to the Biden administration's massive green energy agenda .
“In the mid-twentieth century, domestic mining accounted for 90 percent of U.S. antimony consumption. Today, the United States no longer mines antimony; instead, it relies on its main geopolitical rival, China, for more than 60 percent of its antimony imports.” CSIS Energy Security & Climate Change Project associate researcher Quill Robinson told DCNF. “Effective China de-risking requires reducing dependence upstream and downstream of the value chain.” (Related: 'Red lights flashing': Defense officials say U.S. is busy preparing for Chinese invasion of Taiwan)
“However, increasing domestic resource extraction, such as critical minerals, has proven to be more politically challenging than building new solar module factories,” Robinson added. “Addressing this problem will require concrete policies, such as permitting reforms, but also a broader commitment from lawmakers to support the safe, environmentally responsible extraction of America’s natural resources.”
Independent Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Republican Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming teamed up in July to introduce a major licensing reform bill that would simplify Major infrastructure and development projects must clear regulatory hurdles and accelerate timetables without completely undermining regulators. The bill has not yet been submitted to the Senate for a vote.
“Projects like this need to mitigate legitimate environmental challenges,” Arnab Datta, director of infrastructure policy at the Progressive Institute, told DCNF. However, government agencies prefer to avoid third-party legal challenges to their reviews rather than thoroughly review more significant environmental issues, which means regulators often spend a lot of time on these minor issues and end up prolonging their reviews. surface.
“In the often volatile and uncertain market environment for these commodities, the challenges of achieving production are compounded by the uncertainty created by licensing and litigation,” continued Datta, who also serves as executive managing director of policy at Employment America. “These companies need a process with certainty and a reasonable timetable, as well as support that helps mitigate volatility caused by China's market behavior.”
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