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--></style></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple style='word-wrap:break-word'><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><div style='border:none;border-top:solid #E1E1E1 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in'><p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>From:</span></b><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'> John Clark <johnkclark@gmail.com> <br><b>…</b></span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal style='mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto'><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'>>…A very small speaker that, considering how tiny <span class=gmaildefault>it </span>is, sounds amazingly good thanks to rare earth magnets<span class=gmaildefault>.</span> <span class=gmaildefault>A</span>lso<span class=gmaildefault>,</span> you can thank rare earth magnets for the haptic vibration feedback that all modern phones have. And Europium displays the red hues you see <span class=gmaildefault>on </span>your screen and Yttrium produces the green. And although <span class=gmaildefault>I</span>ndium isn't a rare earth it is a rare metal<span class=gmaildefault>,</span> and almost all of it comes from, you guessed it, China. And without Indium you wouldn't have a touch sensitive screen because Indium Tin Oxide is one of the very few solid<span class=gmaildefault> </span>substances that is both electrically conductive and optically transparent. </span></b><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'>John K Clark<o:p></o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'>Of course to all, but the electronics industry doesn’t need much material.<o:p></o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'>We can easily estimate it however. My cell phone has a mass of 224 grams. I can’t imagine REEs are more than 10% of that, so say 25 grams per cell phone. Imagine 300 million cell phones that are replaced without recycling on the average about every 3 years, so about 100 million cell phones per year. I don’t know what fraction of those are American made, but AI is very helpful in saying almost none. OK, scratch that notion.<o:p></o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'>Let us look at cell phones made outside of China. AI says it as about a third. OK then. Let us assume China stops exporting phones and we get them from outside China and we need 100 million a year and each one contains about 25 grams of REEs. Scratch that, AI says about 1% of a cell phone is REE. So, 2.5 grams each, times 100 million phones, 250 tons a year. Trivial. Recycle a few wind turbines or a submarine for a coupla years until Mountain Pass is producing everything we need. Don’t worry about the cost of the material, if a 1000 dollar phone uses 2.5 grams of the stuff. The highest spot price I saw was about 1800 a kg, so we are looking at 5 dollars worth of material assuming the most expensive of the REEs.<o:p></o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'>Again, the REE problem is grossly exaggerated (possibly at least in part for political or economic considerations (such as to run up the stock price in Mountain Pass (which I would cheer for if I owned any of that stock (or opposition to tariffs (which I also oppose (but not for that REE reason (rather because free trade is inherently a good thing (it lifts the masses out of poverty.)))))))<o:p></o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'>spike<o:p></o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span class=gmaildefault><b><span style='font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div></div></div></div></div></body></html>