MOSCOW, May 20. The development of transport accessibility, including railway lines, the construction of power plants are necessary for implementation of projects to extract and process rare earth metals (REM) in the Arctic, Russia's Minister for Development of the Far East and Arctic Alexey Chekunkov told TASS.
"[We need] transport accessibility - we need new railway lines and ports, the development of the Northern Sea Route, [we need] energy supply - we need the construction of power plants, including small nuclear power plants," he said.
The minister pointed to the responsible attitude to environmental risks. "The extraction of REM is often associated with radioactive waste such as thorium and uranium, which requires special technologies. Also, due to sanctions and export restrictions, we need to look for alternative sales markets," the minister said.
Earlier, the minister said the development of deposits of rare and rare earth metals (RM and REM) in Russia will cover 7% of the global lithium deficit by 2040. By implementing the projects, the country will build up use of Russian RM and REM in production of high-tech and strategic products, and will take up to 15% of the global beryllium market.