Real value of resources | Video of the day

The financial crisis has shown that speculation, funds, and credit default swaps create a huge amount of virtual wealth, but the real economic motor is driven by the manufacture of products using the earth's natural resources. The race is already on to control rare resources like lanthanum, scandium and thulium; essential for hi-tec but everyday products such as computers and mobile phones.

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[charlessmyth]

@Renegen1 They are rare because they are trace metals, not because the deposits of them, are rare per se. This means that vast amounts of base material has to be mined, in order to extract any usable amount of the rare earths, which is environmentally at odds with the demands of the environmentalists. You can't have it both ways, if you want to promote environmentally friendly technologies that use rare earths.

[marktsheppard]

@infinummjb I stand corrected... rare moon metals, now those are three words that make me think of the possibilities

[infinummjb]

@marktsheppard rare Earth metals? On moon? None for sure.

Rare Moon metals, well that's another story ;)

Governments went to the moon just for show.

If private business ever goes to the moon, we can be sure they'll go for profit.

Can't wait for all the revolutionary technology that will be developed along the way :)

[marktsheppard]

I wonder if and what kind of rare earth metals are on the moon... I don't want to go too much of topic but imagine if the Roman Empire kept flourishing and advancing in technology, they were on the verge of an industrial revolution... if not for set backs, we would probably have some kind of a mining colony by now... mining the moon is in our future

[Renegen1]

Even without environmental regulations, China has more deposits. We simply don't know where the rare earth minerals are.

[von32897]

What a coincidence how the U.S just happened to find those resources in Afghanistan! Well, not all of us Americans are dumbed down. We know the truth.

[von32897]

Shhhhhh! Not too loud. The U.S Gov might want to go to WAR to take over those resources.

[charlessmyth]

This is only true to the extent that the regulations that restrict mining and exploration in the western/developed world, do not apply to the likes of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) South America and China.