Rare Earth Elements (REEs) and Strategic Importance

Rare Earth Elements (REEs) are a group of 17 metals with special magnetic, light-emitting and electrical properties. Tiny amounts of them make modern technology work: phone screens, electric vehicle motors, wind turbines, missiles and medical scanners. Despite the name, most of them are not truly rare in the earth's crust. What is hard is finding them in rich enough deposits and separating them from each other, which is costly, slow and polluting.

Which 17 elements are they?

The group has:

• The 15 lanthanides, from lanthanum (atomic number 57) to lutetium (71): lanthanum, cerium, praseodymium, neodymium, promethium, samarium, europium, gadolinium, terbium, dysprosium, holmium, erbium, thulium, ytterbium and lutetium.
• Plus scandium (21) and yttrium (39), which behave chemically like the lanthanides and are found with them.

Light vs heavy rare earths

Rare earths are often split into two groups:

• Light rare earths (LREEs): roughly lanthanum to samarium (for example, cerium, praseodymium, neodymium). These are more common.
• Heavy rare earths (HREEs): roughly europium to lutetium, plus yttrium (for example, terbium, dysprosium). These are scarcer and usually more valuable.
• The exact dividing line differs slightly between agencies. Scandium is often kept outside both groups.

Why are they called "rare" if they are not rare?

Cerium, for example, is about as common in the earth's crust as copper. The problem is that rare earths are spread thinly and are always mixed together. Because they are chemically very similar, separating one from another needs hundreds of repeated chemical steps (called solvent extraction). Think of trying to separate 17 kinds of almost identical sugar dissolved in one glass of water. That is what makes them "rare" in practice.

What are they used for?

A few examples UPSC often asks about:

• Neodymium and praseodymium: the strongest permanent magnets (NdFeB magnets), used in EV motors, wind turbines, phones, speakers and hard disks.
• Dysprosium and terbium: added to magnets so they keep working at high temperatures, as in EV motors.
• Samarium: samarium-cobalt magnets, used in defence and aerospace because they work at very high temperatures.
• Europium, terbium and yttrium: phosphors that give colour in LED lights and screens.
• Cerium: glass polishing and catalytic converters in vehicles.
• Lanthanum: camera lenses and some batteries.
• Gadolinium: contrast agent in MRI scans.

How do we get them? The value chain

Making a usable rare earth product takes many steps:

1. Mining: digging up ore or beach sands that contain rare earth minerals (like monazite or bastnäsite).
2. Beneficiation: concentrating the useful mineral and removing waste rock or sand.
3. Separation: splitting the mixed rare earths into individual oxides (for example, neodymium oxide). This is the hardest and most polluting stage.
4. Metal making: turning oxides into pure metals and alloys.
5. Final products: making magnets, phosphors, catalysts and other goods.

Most of the value and difficulty lies in steps 3 to 5, not in mining.

Why is China so dominant?

China built its rare earth industry from the 1980s and 1990s, accepted the heavy pollution of processing, and kept prices low, which drove many other producers out of business. As per the International Energy Agency, in 2024 China accounted for about 60% of mined production of magnet rare earths, about 91% of refined output and about 94% of sintered permanent magnet production.

As per the US Geological Survey (2025), China also has the largest reserves (about 44 million tonnes of rare earth oxide), followed by Brazil (about 21 million tonnes) and India (about 6.9 million tonnes). World mine production in 2024 was about 3,90,000 tonnes, of which China produced about 2,70,000 tonnes.

How has China used this as a lever?

Rare earths have been used as a pressure tool more than once:

• 2010: During a dispute with Japan over a fishing boat captain near the disputed Senkaku (Diaoyu) islands, China informally halted rare earth shipments to Japan. China also cut its export quotas sharply that year, and prices shot up.
• 2012 to 2014: The US, EU and Japan challenged China's export quotas and duties at the WTO. In 2014, the WTO ruled against China. China removed the quotas in January 2015 and the export duties in May 2015.
• April 2025: China placed seven medium and heavy rare earths (samarium, gadolinium, terbium, dysprosium, lutetium, scandium and yttrium) and related magnets under strict case-by-case export licences.
• October 2025: China announced much wider controls, including rules that could reach products made anywhere in the world using small amounts of Chinese rare earths. After a US-China summit in Busan at the end of October 2025, China suspended these October measures for one year, but the April 2025 licensing rules stayed in place.

India's position

India has large resources but small output:

• India's rare earths are found mainly in monazite in coastal beach sands of Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Odisha and Andhra Pradesh (and also Maharashtra and Gujarat). Some inland hard-rock deposits are found in Gujarat and Rajasthan.
• Monazite also contains thorium, a radioactive element used in nuclear energy. So it is treated as an atomic mineral, and rare earth mining from monazite has been handled by the government-owned IREL (India) Limited, formerly Indian Rare Earths Limited.
• IREL was set up on 18 August 1950 with its first unit at Aluva (Kerala). It became a full government company under the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) in 1963. Its units include Chavara (Kerala), Manavalakurichi (Tamil Nadu) and the Odisha Sands Complex (OSCOM) at Chhatrapur in Odisha.
• The Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Amendment Act, 2023 listed 24 critical and strategic minerals in Part D of the First Schedule. "Rare earth group of elements (not containing uranium and thorium)" is one of them. Only the central government can auction mining leases for these minerals.
• Rare earth elements are on India's first list of 30 critical minerals, released by the Ministry of Mines in June 2023.
• The National Critical Mineral Mission (NCMM), approved in January 2025, has a government outlay of ₹16,300 crore plus an expected ₹18,000 crore from public sector companies, to boost exploration, processing and recycling of critical minerals including rare earths.

Commonly confused concepts

• Rare earth elements vs critical minerals: Rare earths are one specific group of 17 elements. Critical minerals are a wider list (30 for India) of minerals important for the economy whose supply is at risk, such as lithium, cobalt, nickel and graphite. All rare earths count as critical, but most critical minerals are not rare earths.
• Rare earths vs rare metals: Metals like lithium, cobalt or platinum are sometimes loosely called "rare", but they are not rare earth elements.
• Light vs heavy rare earths: Light ones (like neodymium) are more common; heavy ones (like dysprosium, terbium) are scarcer, and China's control over them is even stronger.
• Reserves vs production: India ranks high in reserves (about 6.9 million tonnes as per USGS) but produces very little. Having reserves under the ground does not mean having usable supply.
• Monazite vs bastnäsite: Monazite (India's main source) contains radioactive thorium, which makes processing more regulated. Bastnäsite (China's and the US's main source) has much less thorium.

Issues, criticism and the way forward

• Processing gap: India's biggest weakness is not mining but separation, metal making and magnet making. Building these takes many years, technology and skilled workers.
• Environmental harm: Processing creates toxic and sometimes radioactive waste. Strict environmental safeguards are needed so that India does not repeat the pollution seen in some mining regions abroad.
• Atomic mineral rules: Because monazite contains thorium, private participation has been limited. Experts argue for clearer rules that allow private companies into processing, under safety controls.
• Price risk: China can lower prices to make new producers outside China lose money. Experts suggest long-term purchase deals, price support and stockpiles.
• Way forward: expand exploration under the NCMM; build separation and magnet plants with private and foreign partners; recycle rare earths from old electronics and motors; and join trusted partnerships such as the Minerals Security Partnership and deals with Australia and other mineral-rich countries.

Concepts to Know

• Lanthanides: A row of 15 elements in the periodic table, from lanthanum to lutetium, that have very similar chemical behaviour.
• Atomic number: The number of protons in an atom's centre (nucleus). Each element has its own atomic number, which fixes its place in the periodic table.
• Solvent extraction: A chemical method where a liquid is used again and again to pull out one element at a time from a mixture. For rare earths it needs hundreds of stages.
• Monazite: A reddish-brown mineral found in beach sands. It contains rare earths and the radioactive element thorium.
• Export control: A government rule that requires a licence before certain goods can be sold abroad, often used for security or as a pressure tool.
• Oxide: A compound of an element with oxygen. Rare earths are usually separated and sold as oxides before being turned into metals.