Highlights
- China controls over 70% of rare earth processing and 90% of midstream sectors like lithium hydroxide and graphite refining.
- Western countries have mineral reserves but struggle with industrial refining capabilities and bureaucratic bottlenecks.
- The global race to rebalance the rare earth supply chain hinges on speed, coordination, and midstream investment.
Jonathan Miller’s Global Insight feature, “Rare Earths: Global Power,” captures the geopolitical tension humming beneath the surface of the clean energy transition. His premise is hard to dispute: critical minerals have replaced oil as the currency of power. From NdPr magnets to lithium hydroxide, control of extraction and processing defines national leverage — and right now, China holds the commanding heights.
Miller’s central figures check out. China’s share of rare earth processing exceeds 70%, while its grip on midstream sectors like lithium hydroxide and graphite refining surpasses 90%. These figures are consistent with recent IEA and U.S. Geological Survey data. His broader thesis — that Western rhetoric outpaces implementation — is similarly grounded. Despite dozens of “friend-shoring” speeches and critical mineral strategies, actual permitting timelines and capital commitments lag years behind policy promises.
The Sharp Edge of Strategic Dependence
Where Miller’s piece excels is in showing that vulnerability is not geological but industrial. Canada, the U.S., and Australia have ample reserves, yet refining bottlenecks and bureaucratic inertia leave them exporting ore rather than value. His comparison of China’s vertically integrated ecosystem — spanning African cobalt, Indonesian nickel, and Inner Mongolian rare earths — to the West’s fragmented patchwork is both accurate and sobering.
Still, the framing occasionally drifts toward dramatization. The suggestion that the U.S. could be “rendered incapable” of resupplying defense systems is plausible but not imminent; the Pentagon’s stockpiling and the DoD’s ongoing contracts with Lynas and MP Materials mitigate near-term risks. Miller also overstates Ukraine’s immediate rare earth potential — geological surveys exist, but economically recoverable reserves remain speculative, particularly in contested regions.
Between Clarity and Campaign
The article’s most subtle bias lies in its West-vs-China dichotomy. It paints Beijing’s industrial policy as almost preternaturally unified and Western efforts as hopelessly sluggish — a compelling narrative, but one that oversimplifies the adaptive capacity of democratic economies. The U.S. Inflation Reduction Act, DoD’s REE stockpile buildout, and Canada’s joint offtake programs with automakers like Stellantis and GM are early but real counterweights.
Why It Matters
For investors and policymakers, the takeaway is not fatalism but timing. The race to rebalance the rare earth supply chain is underway — but speed, coordination, and midstream investment will determine who controls the magnets that drive both EVs and missiles.
Citation: Jonathan Miller, “Rare Earths; Global Power,” Global Insight (opens in a new tab), International Bar Association, September 15, 2025.
©
Gesturing at Ukraine as a potential REE supplier is nuts. The East ‘contested area’ is strewn with landmines and unexploded ordinance. This is the part with most of its known orebodies.
There are areas of France still no-go from WW1 for exactly this reason.
Geologists are reluctant to risk losing a leg, no matter how glittering the prize.
I say Slava Ukraine, yet any sober analysis has to conclude much of its lands have been neutralised, if not sterilised.
This impediment cannot be wished away.
Ash