The Wartime Mining Boom Exporting Rare Earths, and Toxins

Levels of arsenic and other toxic minerals have spiked to dangerous levels in Thai waterways like the Kok River, seen here in June.

In an article by The New York Times, Hannah Beech asserts that unregulated mining activity led by Chinese enterprises in conflict-ravaged Myanmar is creating an environmental calamity in neighboring Thailand.

The toxic legacy of this rare earth industry illustrates the complex trade-offs made to power carbon-free energy. The so-called heavy rare earth elements mined in Myanmar are used in electric vehicles, wind turbines and nuclear power plants. They are not actually that rare but are usually dispersed in other ores, and extracting them can be extraordinarily destructive to the environment. To procure one ton of heavy rare earths, such as terbium or dysprosium, tens of thousands of tons of earth must be moved and treated, often producing a mountain of contaminated waste.

In this remote corner of Southeast Asia, the mining boom is a byproduct of a fierce civil war in Myanmar, where the ruling military’s decades of repression have catalyzed ethnic armed groups and pro-democracy forces to fight back. To fill their war chests, the military and some of the militias rely on a panoply of illegal businesses, from synthetic drugs and opium to wildlife poaching to online scams. Many of these enterprises are directed by Chinese crime syndicates, which have expanded into Southeast Asia after crackdowns at home.

The latest money-spinner is mining. Since the military staged a coup in 2021, the number of rare earth mines in just one state in Myanmar has nearly tripled, to about 370 at the end of 2024, the Institute for Strategy and Policy-Myanmar found, with a combined export value of more than $4 billion.