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US rare earth push leaves junior miners and processing gap, says Flynn
About 90% of mined raw rare earth material still goes abroad for processing, and roughly half the mining workforce is expected to retire by 2029, Flynn says.
Mining.com reports retired general Charles Flynn, former head of US Army Pacific and the army’s chief operating officer, says the United States is spending billions on a small set of large rare earth producers while the junior miners, service providers, and workforce needed to turn deposits into mines remain outside the effort.
Flynn argues the build-out should be treated as a five to 10 year industrial campaign, citing a wide gap in the supply chain. He says about 90% of the raw material the US mines still goes abroad for processing, and that roughly half of the mining workforce reaches retirement age by 2029.
He compares the pattern to defense contracting, where capital concentrates on prime contractors while subcontractors are overlooked. Flynn credits the Trump administration with increasing urgency around critical minerals, but says the funding often resembles support for the equivalent of prime contractors, leaving upstream to downstream bottlenecks in place.
Flynn points to downstream constraints as well, saying US backed producers including MP Materials, Energy Fuels, and Phoenix Tailings continue to sell much of their output to buyers in Japan and South Korea because domestic magnet manufacturing has not expanded as fast as upstream investment. He also highlights the lack of capacity for service providers that do exploration, laboratory and chemistry work, pilot testing, land management, and waste solutions, and he urges an industrial systems approach rather than isolated announcements and grants, including a cited $200 million grant where offtake is still years away.