Mining for Rare Earth Metals in the Pristine Continent of Greenland Could Cause Its Destruction or Not?

Mining Lights As China's grip on these rem's (rare earth metals) gets tighter mining companies are looking to exploit the deposits of rare earth metal bearing minerals that can be found under the icy expanse of Greenland. But with small or no regulation, and no overall oversight, these mines could be a catastrophe for the pristine Arctic landscape?
These rare earth metals are essential for our digital economy and without them a digitally driven, green tidy - powered economy would not be feasible. China who currently supply 97 percent of the global demand for these 17 rare earth metals which are present in lithium-ion batteries, electric automobile motors, solar panels and wind turbines and far more.

Greenland contains a wealth of rare earth minerals bearing rem's if the mining companies can extract them. Often the minerals will be covered in thick ice sheets then if not the places where they are found are so remote any accidents from mining would be multiplied with knock on effects reaching far in to the ecology.

 large-scale mining projects are about to be initiated in Greenland, of which will be mining for rem's with another 120 sites being explored. However gigantic the land of Greenland is, it's only a total population of around 57,000. The Greenland Bureau of Minerals and Petroleum which has the task of overseeing the mining operations and dealing with everything from finances to the environmental impact, has a total staff of around 30.

However as the US gears up to start Mining Lights for these minerals so is Greenland. The major query raised here is. Is Greenland prepared for the large mining operations about to descend on it?

The mining operations could potentially threaten fish stocks and marine mammals that are already under threat from climate alter.

A tiny overseeing agency watching these mining behemoths could be a recipe for bad behaviour. With no natural light for long parts of the year, it would be difficult for companies to monitor such things as wastewater spills, but they would care anyway? Greenland doesn't have facilities to process wastewater anyway.

However there's methods to mine in a first rate manner and this ought to include an extreme scaling-up of the Greenland Bureau of Minerals and Petroleum, strengthening best-practice terms for companies, and implementing a zero-discharge owner.

But what is the world to do? Without these metals, they cannot ditch oil, coal mines, and other dirty sources of energy. It is true though that these metals s come with all sorts of hazards themselves as China cites itself part of its owner on restricting exports is to protect its current resource and to deal with the environmental destroy done by years of poorly regulated mining.

The EU has a nice track record and perhaps closer collaboration with it would help.