AKIPRESS.COM - The toxic time bomb set by China’s rare earths mining boom is set to boost the prospects for some of the $12 billion of projects being developed outside the world’s biggest supplier, Bloomberg said,

As part of its pollution clean-up, China, which controls 90 percent of the global market, is studying the introduction of new taxes and regulations for rare earths in the second half that are forecast to drive prices higher.

The measures will add to pressures loosening China’s stranglehold on the production of rare earths, 17 chemically similar elements used in products from Apple Inc. (AAPL:US)’s iPods to Toyota Motor Corp. (7203) hybrid-electric cars and Tomahawk cruise missiles made by Raytheon Co. (RTN:US)

“Higher prices may spur the development of overseas rare earths’ mining projects,” said Chen Huan, a rare earth analyst with Beijing Antaike Information Development Co., a research unit of the state-backed China Nonferrous Metals Industry Association, who forecasts prices may rise more than 20 percent because of the flagged new rules.

The proposed changes come after the World Trade Organization ruled in March that the Asian nation already had violated global trade rules by imposing export restrictions such as quotas and duties on rare earths. Global stocks of rare earths were depleted after China, which consumes about 70 percent of global supplies, cut exports from 2010.

“They’re clamping down on illegal production, have environmental concerns and there are countries which require rare earths who don’t particularly want to be beholden to China,” said Kevin Schultz, deputy chairman of Northern Minerals Ltd. (NTU), developing the Browns Range project in Australia. “There’s an opportunity.”