McLellan, et al., reported in 2014 that Rare Earths have been of considerable interest in recent years for a variety of reasons, in particular due to concerns over the security of supply for modern high efficiency electronics and energy technologies. Such concerns have placed them among the list of “critical” or “strategic” elements in countries such as the United States of America, the European Union, Japan and even in the largest producer and holder of reserves, China. Focus has been given to the environmental impacts of production, and on the distribution of reserves and politico-economic conflict oversupply, but international academic work quantifying these impacts is lacking. Moreover, broader consideration of sustainability impacts and benefits in a systematic manner – particularly in regard to the social impacts of RE extraction, processing and utilization – is not yet apparent.
This paper undertakes a review of the literature and state-of-play of sustainability assessment of rare earth elements. Furthermore, the paper highlights areas of sustainability research considered by academic and industrial representatives to be essential for filling these gaps, and a pathway forward towards a more sustainable rare earths industry.The literature relating to RE was extensively reviewed from both academic and industry sources. Due to the lack of literature specifically into sustainability of RE, focus was placed on examination of literature covering four associated categories: environmental, social, economic and technical aspects of RE supply chains. The first three of these categories follow the widely used approach of the triple-bottom-line (TBL) however, it is also acknowledged that more literature does not specifically examine any of these categories, but focuses on the technical (technological and scientific) aspects of RE. Without understanding these technical aspects, it is argued that it is impossible to examine RE sustainability. These four areas combined give a reasonable picture of the state-of-play in considering a variety of sustainability impacts of RE.
From the reviewed literature, key topics were drawn out, and in conjunction with recent discussions between academic and industry stakeholders, some important research themes for the future were identified, such as:
- Quantification of the environmental and social externalities of extraction and processing of RE - firstly from conventional sources as a baseline, but also from the unconventional sources under consideration (this should include a widely-based and rigorous life cycle assessment),
- Consideration of policies to enhance the closing of the material cycle, enabling more cost effective recycling,
- Effective policies and methods for waste valorization (a Marxist term, "the valorisation or valorization of capital is the increase in the value of capital assets through the application of value-forming labor in production, treatment and storage" in the RE industry, and
- Better integration of community stakeholder concerns along the supply chain.
A number of emerging initiatives to link industry and academia are being funded globally, with research into the sustainability impacts and implications of these key materials as important elements of the research agenda.
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