Ann: Allkem and Livent to merge - presentation, page-318

I've never felt so dirty and close to being in bed with the American military-industrial-energy complex. But I suppose it's either this, or capitulate to powers which already have a ruthless and embarrassing head start. As usual the "great Aussie quarry" is going to sell us all short and still not do enough value add locally I'm sure.

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Pentagon to secure Australian minerals in green deal
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"A number of key minerals are common to almost every list: lithium, cobalt, nickel, graphite, magnesium, manganese and rare earths.

As the US Council on Foreign Relations noted a couple of weeks ago, “China dominates the critical mineral supply chain”, starting with extraction and around the globe. “Regardless of where mines might be located, China owns or finances many of them,” the CFR noted.To an even greater extent, China dominates the processing of those minerals, according to CFR, including “65 percent of cobalt refining, nearly 60 percent of the lithium refining, and as much as 95 percent of manganese refining”.

"In the case of some of the 17 rare earth elements, China controls 100 per cent.“China is not just the world’s No. 1 in rare earths processing,” says Tim Buckley, resources analyst and director of Climate Energy Finance. “In some cases there is no one else.”

"Under the new agreement, Biden affirmed a plan to ask the US congress to add Australia as a “domestic source” within the meaning of Title III of the Defense Production Act, so as to “streamline technological and industrial base collaboration, accelerate and strengthen AUKUS implementation, and build new opportunities for United States investment in the production and purchase of Australian critical minerals, critical technologies, and other strategic sectors”.
"The translation is, he will seek approval from congress for the Pentagon to directly fund projects in this country."

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https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/economy/2023/05/27/pentagon-secure-australian-minerals-green-deal