Canada could become a key supplier of rare earth metals for high-tech devices

Flatscreen TVs, laptops and Apple's iPhones all use rare earth metals. It's a market that a many Canadian companies are trying to compete in. Rare earth metals are also used in wind turbines, iPod earbuds, hybrid electric cars and in the military. China controls 97% of the production of rare earth metals and they just cut-off exports to Japan. Though they're called rare earth metals but they're not actually in short supply. There are a group of 17 similar metallic elements whose names are cerium, terbium, dysprosium and neodymium. The "heavy" rare earth metals are critical to the production of magnets found in wind turbines, computer hard drives and electric motors. They can tolerate very high temperatures. The Chinese have cut back on exports because they have to meet their own domestic demand. Luckily,Canadian companies could be the closest to producing an alternate supply of "heavy" rare earth metals. South Africa and Australia are right behind.

In my opinion, Rare Earth Metals are very important for the future and now. In the future, more and more of our energy is going to be Eco friendly. To do this we will need and rely on a safe secure source of Rare Earth Metals. I also think that we should not allow China to own 97% of the market. It is rumoured that China completely destroyed their environment around the mines when extracting the metals. They wanted the metals at any cost. The U.S. in contrast, have tough environmental regulations that have, so far, prevented them from mining the rare earth's in Utah, Wyoming and in Colorado. Hopefully that will change. When you extract the metals there are very toxic chemical byproducts. There were also rumours that China was using slave labor to mine the metals. Thankfully, Canada has large potential to mine rare earth metals including the "heavy metals. Mines in Saskatchewan and Labrador are moving ahead.