The "rare earth" chemistry

My grandfather earned his metallurgy degree back in 1938.  Yes, that long ago. For reasons that will be a tad too long for this post, he chose to study at the university in Benares (Varanasi) by the Ganga, far, far, away from his home in Sengottai--which is very close to the peninsular tip in southern India.  If not for his mother threatening to kill herself should he take up a job far away from home, grandfather would have put his education to far greater use.

But, playing with the cards he was dealt, grandfather worked for quite a few years at Indian Rare Earth, and split his time between Manavalakurichi and Chavara.  He worked there until his horribly untimely death when he was just about 51 years old.  (Since then, family lore is that every male in the family goes through a crisis at that age; I wonder what awaits me then; bring it on, cosmos!!!)

I was four when he died.  Soon after that, my parents thought that I as a four year old kid might be a great distraction for my grandmother from her grief, which is how I ended up spending about eight months with her, while the rest of my cohorts went to kindergarten :)  Throughout my growing up, I was immensely influenced by the fantastic stories about him that my grandmother, my mother, and my aunts always had about him.  Not one had anything even remotely negative to say about him.  As kids, we thought it was strangely interesting to see test-tubes of sands of different colors tucked away in a cabinet, and I recall mixing them up wondering whether they would explode :)

So, why "rare earth"?

The rare earths start at lanthanum, Element 57, and run to lutetium, Element 71, and if you look them over, there's a good chance you won't recognize any of them.

Why are these rarely heard elements in the news?  Why is this important?

some patient chemists have learned to exploit the subtle differences among rare earth elements to create amazing technology. Neodymium and gadolinium now make unprecedentedly powerful magnets, which can cool and refrigerate things for pennies, replacing nasty, expensive, ozone-killing chemicals. The Honda Prius uses neodymium in fuel cells. Cerium makes great catalytic converters to clean pollution up, and europium makes energy-efficient LED bulbs. Many superconductors use yttrium, and even simple wind turbines need dysprosium and terbium to store energy, among other things.

Fascinating.  Absolutely wonderful that these rare elements play such significant roles.  So, is America leading the charge on this?  Ahem ... while we were busy fudging mortgage loans, waging wars, and watching reality shows,

China has half of the world's reserves and produces a staggering 95 percent of the ore on the world market. That's because the Chinese government made a shrewd guess in the 1990s and invested in the infrastructure necessary to tediously separate one rare earth from another on an industrial scale. China's dominance wouldn't be a huge concern except that the government has put strict quotas on exports lately. Some rare earths now fetch more than $100 a pound in the United States. (The U.S. once mined rare earths but let the industry flag and would need about 15 years to catch up.)

You got to be kidding here ... come on, isn't there anything that the US can do anymore?
Oh well ...