After All, What Are Rare Earths and Why Could They Change a Country's Economy?

After All, What Are Rare Earths and Why Could They Change a Country’s Economy?

Written by Romário Pereira de Carvalho

Published on 27/07/2025 at 09:00

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Trump’s Statement on Greenland Exposes Global Race for Rare Earths Vital for Technology, Defense, and U.S. Independence from China

In May of this year, President Donald Trump reaffirmed that the United States needed “a lot” from Greenland. The statement reignited the debate over the possible annexation of the Danish territory.

The reason behind the insistence lies in the large amount of critical minerals, especially rare earths, beneath the island’s ice sheet.

Rare earths are a category of 17 chemical elements, including scandium, yttrium, and the lanthanides.

ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW

Military Use Increases Importance of Rare Earths

In addition to their use in electronic products, rare earths are fundamental to the national defense of the United States.

According to a research note published in 2025 by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), these metals are used in F-35 fighter jets, Tomahawk missiles, submarines, satellites, lasers, and other military technologies.

The American dependency is significant. According to the International Energy Agency, 61% of the world’s rare earth production comes from China.

Even more significant: the Asian country controls 92% of global production in the processing stage, which includes the separation of elements after mining.

Technical Difficulty Increases External Dependency

Although these metals are found throughout the Earth’s crust and are even more abundant than gold, extraction and processing are costly and have environmental impacts.

Furthermore, the United States lacks the capacity to separate the heavy elements, which are scarcer and more complex to isolate.

Until the beginning of this year, even rare earths mined in California were sent to China for the separation process.

This information was confirmed by Gracelin Baskaran, director of the Critical Minerals Security Program at CSIS, in an interview with CNN.

Tariffs and Tensions Increase Risk for the U.S.

However, this process was interrupted after the Trump administration’s decision to impose high tariffs on China, announced in April.

In response, the Chinese government maintained strict controls on the export of seven rare earth minerals and their associated products.

The measure was interpreted as retaliation against the “reciprocal tariffs” imposed by the U.S.

Despite the truce signed in Geneva, U.S. officials hoped Beijing would ease these restrictions, which has not yet happened.

Between 2020 and 2023, 70% of American imports of rare earth compounds and metals came from China, according to a report from the U.S. Geological Survey.

Greenland, Ukraine, and Saudi Arabia Come into Focus

Besides China, the United States has begun to prioritize rare earths in its foreign policy with other countries.

One of the recent moves was the signing of a “rare earth agreement” with Ukraine. There is also interest in Saudi Arabia and Greenland, which Trump mentioned directly.

According to Gracelin Baskaran, Ukraine still has a very nascent mining industry. While the country is considered in strategic plans, there is still no clear data on the economic viability of extraction in its territory.

The race for rare earths continues, and the United States is seeking alternatives to reduce its dependence on China.

The competition remains open and has implications that go beyond trade, affecting areas such as technology and national security.

With information from CNN.

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After All, What Are Rare Earths and Why Could They Change a Country’s Economy?

Trump’s Statement on Greenland Exposes Global Race for Rare Earths Vital for Technology, Defense, and U.S. Independence from China

Military Use Increases Importance of Rare Earths

Technical Difficulty Increases External Dependency

Tariffs and Tensions Increase Risk for the U.S.

Greenland, Ukraine, and Saudi Arabia Come into Focus

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After All, What Are Rare Earths and Why Could They Change a Country’s Economy?

Trump’s Statement on Greenland Exposes Global Race for Rare Earths Vital for Technology, Defense, and U.S. Independence from China

Military Use Increases Importance of Rare Earths

Technical Difficulty Increases External Dependency

Tariffs and Tensions Increase Risk for the U.S.

Greenland, Ukraine, and Saudi Arabia Come into Focus

A giant printer called the “Ferrari” of concrete has landed in Latin America and can already build a 120-square-meter house in just 48 hours, making the traditional construction site look like something from the last century.

Brazil will harvest a record crop of up to 357 million tons of grains, but it does not have the capacity to store a large part of it. The storage deficit has reached the highest level in history and is equivalent to almost the entire production of Argentina.

Four times faster than the Concorde, capable of taking passengers from New York to London in less than an hour at Mach 5.5, and with an engine that switches from turbojet to ramjet mid-flight at Mach 3.5, the Hermeus Quarterhorse went from paper to its first flight in just 19 months.

She started by collecting oyster shells from restaurants and today she has already accumulated more than 10 tons to restore reefs, recover coastal habitats, and demonstrate how a common waste can become a tool for ocean conservation.

SpaceX will dock a $843 million vehicle to the International Space Station to push a nearly 420-ton laboratory against the atmosphere and make the debris fall in a controlled manner into the ocean.

China opens the world’s first school where more than 100 humanoid robots from different brands will study together, each movement will be repeated up to 600 times a day and the data will feed a collective brain that will teach all the robots of the future.

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A giant golden ball in the middle of gardens in India was assembled with 1,415 discs, took decades to be completed, and transforms sunlight into controlled central lighting.

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The largest neighborhoods in each state of Brazil are astonishing in size: Campo Grande leads with 352,000 inhabitants, Cidade Industrial exceeds 172,000, and Jorge Teixeira dominates the North.

China prepares a “panoramic Hubble” with 2.5 billion pixels and a field of view 300 times larger: Xuntian will have a 2-meter mirror, resolution close to that of the American telescope, can dock at the Tiangong space station for maintenance, and promises to map 40% of the sky in a decade.