Rare Earth - Lynas Advanced Materials Plant (Part 3)

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Boonlee Ooi: I have few questions, hope you dont mind to explain.
1) Since you are rare earth expert and work with many companies around the world. Can you share how many rare earth plants in the world which is operating now. Or where can I find the source?


Nick Tsurikov: I think I did put a small note on currently operating and (closed by now) plants. There are some in China (obvioulsy), in India, and Central Asia. At least three that I know of are in an 'advanced state of development', in South Africa, USA and Australia and I am also aware of about a dozen of projects that are in the stage of "resource definition drilling". That's more or less answers no.1.

Boonlee Ooi: Thanks for information. If there is some source which shows list of rare earth plant around the world will be better.


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Boonlee Ooi: 2) I heard that rare earth plant was built away from population. Is there any rare earth plant build at high population town? Where is it?


Kiyo Howell:
2) China's Baotou Rare Earth refineries are in close proximity to over 2million residents.
considering at the moment China accounts for more than 95% of world production, I find it hard to believe any plants would be significantly remote.
(Kiyo Howell, his expertise is "dangerous goods" transportation. Dangerous Goods include ratioactive goods - usually consigments of radiation therapy material, and spent X-ray tubes. He often handle soil and water samples classified as radioactive)


Nick Tsurikov: With No.2 - as I am yet to update my 'radiation monitor' photo with the pic I took at Mount Weld (my apologies, just too many things to do...), I'll do some 'wandering around' the google earth and image editing as well. In the evening, have work to do...
I have seen somewhere (don't remember, honestly, where) some google earth thingy with an arrow between the LAMP site and Kuantan showing 20 kms or so... There are plenty of plants in Australia where one of the rare earth minerals is mined and processed, together with others (the stuff called monazite that was apparenty processed at Bukit Merah). I'll make up some maps with the locations of the plants and nearest population indications as well. My guess that this would be a fair comparison - as (a) one of the materials is, actually, rare earth mineral, (b) the overall 'radioactivity concentration' of minerals processed varies (similar to amang) from about 1-2 to about 90 Bq/g - about 15 times more than Lynas concentrate or residue, and (c) there are several places in Australia and you will clearly see how far and/or how close these plants are to the people.

Boonlee Ooi: 2) Kiyo Howell has given example China's Baotou rare earth plant which built in high population area. This is not a good example plant. It is many issues of radioactive from Baotou rare earth plant. Actually, I would like to know any “healthy” example plant which operates safely and it is located in high population area?


Nick Tsurikov: I think I've answered (1) and (2) as best as I could.



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Boonlee Ooi: 3) Do you think our country suitable to build the plant? Here is high rain country. Kuantan is one of often get flood area. You can google “Kuantan flood”, it will shows you many incidents. Lynas is claimed here has good facilities, like power supply, water supply and near to port. Cant whole Australia find a location with these facilities? We don’t have a good draining system. Plus heavy rain frequently and monsoon area, Kuantan was get flood many times. Then do you think a rare earth plant suit to build at a place easy to get flood?

Nick Tsurikov: With No.3, there is no point in going into 'Australia or Malaysia discussion', this has nothing to do with me and I would not know for sure anyway. However, to answer the question - yes, there should not be big deal of a problem in tropical climate. If you'll look at uranium mining sites - all the serious mistakes that may have been made were fixed by the end of 1970's - mid 1980's. And uranium mines/plants - where the tailings dams are tens of times larger than anything can ever be at Lynas, and where the radionuclides is tailings may be quite soluble (=environmentally mobile), and where there is a 'radon issue' that will be absent at Kuantan... They do operate (and dipose the waste) quite successfully in both tropical climate, temperate climate or in places where it can be minus 50 in winter. I did 'look into' all varieties - and the only possibly serious issue is where those tailings dams are in the mountains in the 'sesmically active' areas. No problem of dealing with much more radioactive and much more mobile uranium tailings in tropical climates, with about 3 meters of rain per year - so there should not be any issue in Kuantan. Plus, I, honestly, don't know why people keep bringing this up - didn't Lynas say that there will be no waste permanently disposed at or near Kuantan...? Or am I missing something...?

Boonlee Ooi: 3. I have to split this question into two parts:

a) Regarding the flood, may be LAMP has designed for 100 year rain (quote from Kiyo Howell’s). but the outside of LYNAS plant, the public draining system, our govt is not design it properly, so that Kuantan will easily flooded. Many cases of flood are happened in kuantan. Other places may be they can handle the rain properly and they are not flooded, but not in Kuantan. I would like to know, what if flood happen, what are the procedures LYNAS will take? Just worst case.
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b) Lynas always told people reason of selected in Kuantan because water supply, power supply, skilled worker, and near to port. I just want to know can’t Australia find a place equipped with these facilities, Yes or No?


Nick Tsurikov: 

In regards to (a) - I haven't got a slightest clue "what procedures will Lynas take" in case of the flood. I could possibly speculate on what procedures I would take - but this most likely be stupid as I have only a vague information of the 'set-up' of the land, river flows and potential flooding... You do need to ask them... 
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In regards to (b) - well...
Issue 1 - skilled workers.
OK... say we can (a) find any - there is a huge labour shortage in mining and mineral processing and then (b) relocate the skilled workers to any place, no matter where - which will be very expensive. But, say, we did that and build a whole new town with cinemas, airport etc... stupid, but OK, let's assume we are silly enough to do this...
Issue 2 - chemicals
Obviously will be much more expensive than in Malaysia, mostly due to the transport costs, but say we have huge amounts of money and will do this too..
Then we get to issue 3 - port.
Needs to be not too far in Western Australia (it would be quite stupid to track the material all across the whole country - might as well send it to Malaysia). We have Perth, Geradton and Esperance, fine... But only Perth can handle containers...
No.4 - power...
Well, how often do you sit without power in KL or Kuantan per year? Our place in Perth on average has 10-12 days per year when we sit around the fire or burn candles. The image of 'Australia has lots of everything' is not exactly true - sure there are some places where the power is almost always on, but on hot days the TV and radio keep reminding us to save energy and not to switch air-conditioning on, unless absolutely necessary. Price of electricity has also doubled here in the last couple of years...
Now we get to No.5 - water...
I think I wrote somewhere here that we already have a desalination plant in Perth and the second one is nearly built. I can only water my garden for several hours a couple of days per week - so had to get rid of some 'water-demanding' plants, as they simply die without daily watering. We do not have enough fresh water in Western Australia, the price of it this year is about 160% of the price the year before and about 250% of the 2009 price - so you can well imagine what would happen if a company like Lynas comes in and says - we're going to take about 10% of Perth water supply to run the plant.
I guess this explains everything, more or less.
Sure, Australia is huge - but it is the 'driest continent'. Place where I live (Eneabba on the google earth map above) has only about 250 mm of rain per year, Laverton near which Lynas mine site is barely gets 200 mm per year...
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So, effectively:
1. Skilled workers could be found at great expense and relocated to the area at even greater expense;
2. Chemicals can be brought in, at a great expense as well;
3. Not too many ports, and in fact only one (Perth-Fremantle) would handle containers;
4. Obtaining electricity supply and maintaining it would be extremely hard and, probably, the only way will be to construct a specifically designated medium size power plant (most likely coal-fired, and there isn't much enthusiasm for more coal burning... diesel-powered one will be so expensive to run that it's not funny);
5. Lastly, the required water supply will be impossible to obtain, in my personal opinion...
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Not talking about Malaysia - you will know much better than me, but I reckon that in general terms all five factors above are much more 'favourable' in Malaysia in comparison with Australia.

Boonlee Ooi: I asked my few friends live in Parth for more than 4 years. They did not have experience power blackout 10-12 days a year.






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