(TheConservativeTimes.org) – The United States government researchers have recently visited a mine in South Korea to access programs that would boost the supply of a critical hard metal named tungsten, used to make weapons, industrial cutting machines, and semiconductors
The mine, called the Sangdong Mine, is set to resume operations this year. China has been dominating over eighty percent of the metal’s supply chain, but this mine could produce fifty percent of the rest of the world’s tungsten supply.
The United States hasn’t mined tungsten in almost ten years, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Four mineral resource scholars visited Sangdong Mine, and the U.S. Geological Survey said it would be making a “significant update” to the mine’s assessment.
Almonty Industries owns the mine and said that it is spending over one hundred million dollars to reopen it.
There is concern regarding the restrictions on exports of Tungsten as the United States increases tariffs on Chinese exports.
The managing director of the consulting firm Teneo, Gabriel Wildau, said, “If Donald Trump wins the US presidency and follows through on his threat to dramatically hike tariffs on China, Beijing might respond with new export controls on critical minerals or deploy existing controls more forcefully.”
He continued, “Chinese regulators may also apply controls selectively, denying minerals to specific foreign companies that are viewed as supporting Washington’s technological containment agenda.”
According to Wildau, the U.S. Energy Department has awarded over one hundred and fifty million dollars in grants to encourage domestic mining.
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