China plans to restrict exports of key minerals needed to make weapons, while U.S. companies that could reduce America's reliance on foreign suppliers are struggling with red tape, energy experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Chinese Government Announced On August 15, it announced restrictions on exports of antimony, a critical mineral that accounts for a large portion of global arms production and is essential for the manufacture of ammunition, night vision goggles, bullets and other equipment vital to national security. According to According to a report submitted to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), US mining company Perpetua Resources has been trying for years to dig through red tape to develop a mine in Idaho's Valley County that would reduce reliance on Chinese supplies of antimony, but slow permitting procedures have been an obstacle, energy experts told DCNF.

Developing a mine like the one Perpetua Resources is looking to operate can take years to obtain all the necessary approvals and permits. One key permitting law currently in place is: National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) also applies to federal land management activities and the construction of certain public infrastructure projects, such as highways.

“After 6 o'clock year With planning and early action, we [NEPA] The permit process was completed in 2016. Currently, there are eight year “We are entering into NEPA,” a Perpetua Resources spokesperson told DCNF. The company wants to mine antimony from the largest deposit in the United States. development It also has the potential to produce millions of ounces of gold.

Diana Fruchtgott-Roth, director of the Heritage Foundation's Center for Energy, Climate, and Environment, argues that while Perpetua Resources' mines do pose environmental problems that need to be addressed, production in the U.S. is almost certainly cleaner than production in China. Moreover, Fruchtgott-Roth said, reliance on China for raw materials needed to produce critical defense equipment poses clear national security risks.

“The United States has the highest environmental standards in the world, not just for mining but for other areas,” Furchtgott-Roth told DCNF. “This is a huge national security risk. We've seen how Russia cut off natural gas supplies to Europe, and it's clear that countries can cut off vital supplies to other countries.”

“If the administration wants to pursue policies that promote electric vehicles, green energy, and other mineral-intensive technologies, it should seek to streamline permitting processes across the board, rather than prioritizing reforms for some favorable development types and deprioritizing others,” Furchtgott-Roth added. (RELATED: 'Make their lives totally miserable': Top US commander outlines 'horrible hellish' response if China invades Taiwan)

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Steve Coonen, a former Department of Defense (DOD) official who focused on technology exports to China, agreed that reliance on China for raw materials needed to produce critical technologies poses clear national security risks.

“The United States has all the rare earth elements it needs, not that different from our energy needs,” Coenen told DCNF, “but Democrats are tying U.S. industry to the gutter by banning the mining of these materials for misguided and ignorant ecological reasons, putting national security and the long-term economic health of the United States at serious risk.”

China accounts for just under 50% of global antimony production and is the source of 63% of current U.S. antimony imports, according to CSIS, while the U.S. mined no “marketable” antimony in 2023. According to To CNBC.

According to CNBC, China's recently announced export restrictions on antimony will take effect on September 15. For many in the industry, China's move to restrict antimony exports would have come as a surprise just a few months ago, which is why China's decision to take this step is “quite confrontational in that respect,” Lewis Black, CEO of Canadian mining company Almonty Industries, told the outlet.

In addition to antimony, China has flexed its muscle by restricting exports of other key minerals it holds global monopolies, including germanium and gallium, from 2023.

“The United States boasts some of the highest permitting standards in the world, but NEPA has been criticized for being inefficient, and much of that criticism is valid,” a Perpetua Resources spokesperson told DCNF. “When we're talking about minerals necessary for America's national and economic security, and our clean energy future, we need an efficient regulatory process that provides strong protections for communities and the environment.”

A Perpetua Resources spokesperson told DCNF that the company expects the process from identifying the first deposits to starting to extract minerals from the site to take 18 years, but added that NEPA will be beneficial in providing greater transparency to the public and an opportunity for the stakeholder community to provide input on the project.

Still, Perpetua Resources said “good projects should not die in bureaucracy” and that it “fully supports a common-sense, bipartisan approach to authorizing reforms.”

Antimony regulations are Existing concerns Amid wars in the Middle East and Europe, and rising tensions with China over Taiwan, many experts are warning about the strength of the U.S. defense industrial base and that the country is becoming overly dependent on adversarial Chinese mineral supplies at a time when minerals are playing a larger role in the U.S. economy thanks in part to the Biden administration's massive green energy policies.

“In the mid-20th century, 90 percent of U.S. antimony consumption came from domestic mining. Today, the U.S. no longer mines antimony and instead relies on its main geopolitical rival, China, for more than 60 percent of its antimony imports,” Quill Robinson, an associate fellow in the Energy Security and Climate Change Program at CSIS, told DCNF. “To effectively hedge against risks to China, we need to reduce our dependence up and down the value chain.” (RELATED: 'Flashing red lights': US scrambling to prepare for Chinese invasion of Taiwan, defense officials say)

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“But increasing domestic resource extraction, such as mining for critical minerals, has proven much more politically difficult than building a new solar module factory,” Robinson added. “Addressing this problem will require not only specific policies like permitting reform, but also a broad commitment from lawmakers to support the safe and environmentally responsible extraction of America's natural resources.”

Independent West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin and Republican Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso teamed up in July to craft legislation that would streamline regulatory hurdles and speed up timelines that major infrastructure and development projects must clear without completely weakening regulators' ability to ensure environmental concerns are addressed. The bill has not yet come up for a vote in the Senate.

“Projects like this have legitimate environmental concerns that need to be mitigated,” Arnab Dutta, director of infrastructure policy at the Institute for Progress, told DCNF. But because government agencies have a strong incentive to avoid legal challenges to third-party reviews rather than thoroughly investigating the more significant environmental issues, regulators tend to spend a lot of time on these minutiae and ultimately extend the deadlines for permits, Dutta explained.

“Uncertainties due to permitting and litigation further complicate the challenge of reaching production in an often volatile and uncertain market environment for these commodities,” continued Dutta, who also serves as managing director of policy implementation for Employ America. “These companies need processes with certainty and reasonable timelines, as well as support to help mitigate the volatility resulting from China's actions in the marketplace.”

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