[Answered] India is a rich source of rare earths, but still imports. Why are they strategically important and what are the challenges India is facing in becoming self-sufficient in rare earth minerals?

The rare earth elements (REE) are a set of seventeen metallic elements i.e., fifteen lanthanides, plus scandium and yttrium. They are not that rare and are relatively abundant in the Earth’s crust. In India, significant rare earth minerals found are ilmenite, sillimanite, garnet, zircon, monazite, and rutile, collectively called Beach Sand Minerals (BSM). Despite having a rich deposit of monazite on beach sand, India is import-dependent for its rare earth supplies due to its mining being restricted to public sector undertakings (PSUs), particularly, the Indian Rare Earth Limited (IREL) and Kerala REL.

Why are they strategically important?

• Rare-earth elements (REE) are necessary components, especially for high-tech products used in the IT sector, space sector, transport sector, and critical defense equipment.
• Due to their unique magnetic, luminescent, and electrochemical properties, they help in technologies to perform with reduced weight, reduced emissions, and energy consumption. Therefore, it give them greater efficiency, performance, miniaturization, speed, durability, and thermal stability.
• China is supplying majority of rare earth minerals and India has been in confrontation with China. Thus, indigenous capacity becomes utmost important.
• The concentration of rare earth materials value chains, from ore to finished product in China, ensures a relative advantage in research, simply because of access and control over the entire ecosystem.

Challenges:

• Passive government attitude: REE mining is restricted to public sector undertakings (PSUs), particularly, the Indian Rare Earth Limited (IREL) and Kerala REL.
• No separate policy: Instead of having a separate policy for REE, the government clubbed REE with atomic minerals. It ensured state monopoly and kept the foreign and private domestic investors away, leading to a stagnant REE sector.
• Financial constraints: The mining and extraction processes of REEs are capital-intensive, consume large amounts of energy, and release toxic by-products.
• Indian Rare Earth Ltd (IREL), which was established to produce REE, never actually focused on REE production. Instead, IREL gave more importance to thorium and other minerals such as ilmenite, zircon, rutile etc.
• Beach sand mining was permitted until a few years ago but was banned in 2016 in an attempt to conserve strategic minerals including rare earths and thorium

India must open its rare earth sector up to competition and innovation, and attract the large amounts of capital needed to set up facilities to compete with the world. The best move forward might be to create a new Department for Rare Earths (DRE) under the Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas, drawing on its exploration, exploitation, refining, and regulation capabilities.