Clean Energy’s Mineral Boom Leaves Scars and Gives China Leverage

https://youtu.be/gHTpTf6noJ8

By Francisco Casais and Alexander Fernandez

Reporters, Life News Today

The global drive to replace gasoline and diesel with electric vehicles and to power grids from wind and solar energy has traded one form of environmental damage for another that cuts deeper into the Earth and spreads across more fragile places. Where tailpipe emissions once stood as the clearest daily cost of energy use, the extraction and processing of critical minerals used in clean energy, now leave permanent scars on landscapes. This shift also gives the country which dominates refining and downstream manufacturing new economic leverage.

Oil and other fossil fuels powered industrial growth and improved living standards across much of the world throughout the twentieth century and into the twenty-first. Yet their combustion released enormous quantities of carbon dioxide and other pollutants, fundamentally altering the Earth’s climate system. Energy-related carbon dioxide emissions reached a record 37.8 billion metric tons in 2024, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), pushing the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide to 422 parts per million. The rise in carbon dioxide drove global average temperatures about 1.45 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, according to measurements from Berkeley Earth, an independent nonprofit that analyzes global temperature data, and the World Meteorological Organization, the United Nations agency that coordinates international climate reports, in 2025. Global warming has intensified heat waves and extreme weather events that damage infrastructure, crops, and human health, while accelerating sea level rise that threatens low-lying coastal regions and island nations, according to reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Ocean absorption of excess carbon dioxide has increased acidity, harming coral reefs and marine food chains that support fisheries for hundreds of millions of people. Air pollution from fossil fuel use is linked to millions of premature deaths each year, particularly in South Asia and East Asia, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

The global push to build electric vehicles and renewable energy systems has triggered a new wave of environmental damage through the large-scale extraction of critical minerals. The extraction of critical minerals begins with geological surveys and exploratory drilling to identify deposits, followed by large-scale earth-moving operations that strip away vegetation and topsoil to reach the ore bodies. For many deposits, companies create open pits that can span kilometers and reach hundreds of meters in depth, using explosives and heavy machinery to break and remove rock. In the case of lithium from brine deposits in South America, operators pump underground saline water into shallow evaporation ponds that cover many square kilometers, where solar energy slowly concentrates the lithium salts over periods of 12 to 18 months before chemical plants extract and purify the compound. The same process used in Chile’s Atacama region lowers local groundwater levels, reducing water available for agriculture and ecosystems that sustain flamingo populations and traditional herding communities, according to a 2019 study published in the journal Science of the Total Environment. Hard rock lithium mining in Western Australia crushes and grinds millions of tons of ore, then roasts the material at high temperatures and treats it with sulfuric acid to extract the lithium, creating vast volumes of waste rock and tailings that operators must store indefinitely on the landscape.

Cobalt production in the Democratic Republic of Congo relies on industrial open-pit and underground mines, as well as artisanal operations where workers dig by hand in unstable conditions, exposing themselves to heavy metal dust and risking collapse, while generating finely ground rock waste mixed with chemicals that contaminate rivers and soils across mining districts affecting drinking water and fish stocks in the Kolwezi and Copperbelt regions, according to a study published in The Lancet Planetary Health. Nickel extraction in Indonesia has expanded rapidly through open-pit mining of laterite ores, which require clearing extensive rainforest areas, followed by either smelting or high-pressure acid leaching, producing acidic wastewater and metal-laden sludge that can pollute coastal waters if containment fails.

Rare earth element mining often occurs in open pits or through in situ leaching, where companies inject chemicals underground to dissolve the minerals before pumping out the solution. Processors use strong acids and solvents, generating radioactive thorium and uranium waste, along with toxic residues, which get stored in large ponds which leak into groundwater in mining districts of Inner Mongolia and Jiangxi province, according to research published in the journal Environmental Pollution. Copper mining worldwide frequently produces acid mine drainage when sulfide minerals in waste rock and tailings react with air and water, forming sulfuric acid, mobilizing heavy metals into streams and aquifers, where the pollution can persist for centuries after operations end. These processes collectively disturb vast land areas, reduce biodiversity, fragment habitats and consume enormous quantities of water and energy while leaving behind legacies of contamination that future generations must manage.

Countries with capital and technical expertise gain economic leverage over developing nations rich in critical minerals by providing financing and infrastructure that enable large-scale development projects in exchange for long-term control over production and exports. Developing nations often possess abundant mineral resources yet lack the billions of dollars required to build mines, processing plants, roads, ports, and power systems needed to introduce native critical minerals to market. External actors step in with loans from development banks or direct equity investments through state-owned or private companies that bundle funding for essential infrastructure with binding agreements on mineral offtake and ownership stakes in the operations.

Over time, this arrangement gives the financing country or its firms significant influence over production, shipping, and pricing, while the host nation receives upfront capital and minimal local employment opportunities. When debt repayment becomes difficult, host governments often grant the financier longer mining concessions or additional resource rights, which strengthens the financier’s economic control over the country. The pattern creates dependency because the profitable work of refining minerals and manufacturing products happens mostly in the financing nations, leaving resource-rich countries with fewer industries and greater exposure to price swings. A dynamic played out across Africa, Latin America and parts of Asia, where mineral wealth has attracted investment, strengthening external influence over national economic priorities and export strategies.

China achieved unmatched dominance in refining and processing, converting raw critical minerals into the materials powering electric vehicles, renewable energy systems, electronics, and defense equipment worldwide. While mining takes place in dozens of countries, Chinese refineries and chemical plants handle roughly 65 percent of global lithium refining, about 70 percent of cobalt processing, over 80 percent of rare-earth separation, and the vast majority of graphite and battery-grade nickel conversion. An international position resulting from sustained government support for research infrastructure and industrial scale-up over decades, which allowed Chinese companies to build capacity faster and at lower cost than competitors in other nations. The consequence is visible in mining operations in Australia, Chile, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Indonesia, which ship ore to China for complex chemical and metallurgical processes that add the most value before returning as components in finished goods.

Control of this midstream bottleneck gives China powerful tools to influence global supply volumes, market prices and the pace at which competing producers can meet industrial specifications for materials essential to the energy transition and high-tech manufacturing. The United States Department of Energy’s 2023 Critical Materials Assessment and the International Energy Agency identified neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium, and terbium as the most critical rare earth elements because of their essential role in high-performance permanent magnets.

Neodymium and praseodymium form the base of those high-strength permanent magnets. Magnet manufacturers add dysprosium and terbium to improve performance under high heat, a key requirement for electric vehicle motors and wind turbines. The International Energy Agency said demand for those four magnet rare earths has doubled since 2015 and projected further growth by 2030, while China accounted for 91 percent of global refined output and 94 percent of permanent magnet production in 2024.

China’s dominance also keeps higher-margin processing, magnet manufacturing, and skilled technical work within the country. Many nations continue to export raw or partially processed materials and import higher-value finished products. As demand rises with the adoption of clean energy technologies and advanced electronics, this concentration reinforces China’s central position in supply chains that will help shape economic competitiveness and technological leadership for decades. Whether the United States, Europe, and other nations succeed in building alternative capacity will help determine who controls the supply chains that will shape global energy systems, advanced technology, and national power for decades to come.