danny17402 t1_jahzsfe wrote on March 1, 2023 at 4:05 PM

Reply to comment by fauxbeauceron in German scientists show a commercially feasible method for cyanobacteria to extract 17 rare earth elements from low-concentration sources. Currently, most of the world's supply of these elements is mined in China. by lughnasadh

We need to ramp up mining by roughly ten times what we're currently doing in the next ten years to meet the EU's goals for the green energy transition.

Nothing is replacing mining. We're already on pace to be behind where we need to be by an order of magnitude, and unfortunately public opinion is not currently where it needs to be to do anything about that. Mining IS environmentally friendly, when it's done right in countries with the proper regulation, in that the local environmental effects are minimal and short term, and it's literally the only way we have any hope of slowing climate change.

Methods like in the OP won't be viable until it's too late, and even then they'll be a drop in the bucket compared to mining.

pend-bungley t1_jakdgrp wrote on March 2, 2023 at 1:25 AM

> We need to ramp up mining by roughly ten times what we're currently doing in the next ten years to meet the EU's goals for the green energy transition.

Do you have any links I can read more about this? Thanks.

danny17402 t1_jakok07 wrote on March 2, 2023 at 2:46 AM

Sorry, I was paraphrasing from a talk I attended last week (I'm an economic geologist), but I don't have the data handy.

Suffice to say, most people in the industry don't have high hopes for our metal output in the next couple of decades. Nuclear is really our only hope imo.