US policymakers for 15 years have done very little to address the risk of dependence on China for rare earths after China’s embargo on exports of crucial rare earth metals to Japan in 2010.
After the embargo, 
Hitachi Metals, which changed its name in 2023 to Proterial, responding to concern from the Obama administration, built a rare earth magnets factory in North Carolina from 2011 to 2013. The Hitachi Metals factory, with several dozen employees, had higher costs than the giant complexes being built in 
Ganzhou. American companies proved unwilling to pay extra for magnets produced in the US and switched to suppliers. Hitachi closed the factory in 2020 and the equipment went into storage.
Zoning and environmental regulations make it hard to open a rare earth mine in the US. Opening a rare earth mine in the US takes 29 years.
“You can spend a whole career getting a mine up and running.”
By contrast, mines in China can be opened quickly and do not have to undergo the same kind of rigorous regulatory approval.
Underpinning all the problems is that the global market for the minerals is tiny next to other kinds of mining, like copper.
Few American companies have wanted to make big investments in rare earths only to face the risk, as Hitachi found, that customers prefer cheaper products from government-backed industries in China.
“US companies have been reluctant to take the plunge.”
nytimes.com/2025/04/16/bus
Hitachi Metals, which changed its name in 2023 to Proterial, responding to concern from the Obama administration, built a rare earth magnets factory in North Carolina from 2011 to 2013. The Hitachi Metals factory, with several dozen employees, had higher costs than the giant complexes being built in Ganzhou. American companies proved unwilling to pay extra for magnets produced in the US and switched to suppliers. Hitachi closed the factory in 2020 and the equipment went into storage.
Zoning and environmental regulations make it hard to open a rare earth mine in the US. Opening a rare earth mine in the US takes 29 years.
“You can spend a whole career getting a mine up and running.”
By contrast, mines in China can be opened quickly and do not have to undergo the same kind of rigorous regulatory approval.
Underpinning all the problems is that the global market for the minerals is tiny next to other kinds of mining, like copper.
Few American companies have wanted to make big investments in rare earths only to face the risk, as Hitachi found, that customers prefer cheaper products from government-backed industries in China.
“US companies have been reluctant to take the plunge.”
nytimes.com/2025/04/16/bus