[chillycharlie]

Hopefully this motivates alternatives to rare earths, China dominates because they can get away with polluting huge areas. For 1 kg of rare earth, you get roughly 200–300 kg of rock tailings, 2–3 kg of chemical/toxic waste.

[cdmckay]

Any sources on this?

From everything I’ve read this is not the case and they instead made it a national priority to have a secure supply.