THE CAR OF THE FUTURE - The Power Surge: Energy, Opportunity, and the Battle for America's Future - page 132

world. h e national security benei ts of greater l exibility would be
real and potentially large.
But many worry there will also be big national security costs stem-
ming from a transition away from oil.

O n September 7, 2010, in the choppy waters of a string of unin-

habited islands in the South China Sea, a Chinese i shing boat
found itself in trouble. 75 If you ask the Japanese, the islands are the
Senkaku, under Tokyo's control since 1972. 76 According to Beijing, they
are the Diaoyu, a Chinese possession for many centuries before. 77 h e
dispute meant both countries plied the waters, and on that Tuesday the
Chinese boat struck two Japanese coast guard ships. h

e captain was

hauled ashore on Ishigaki Island and arrested.
In the weeks at er Zhan Qixiong was detained, Beijing appeared to
strike back. Its customs oi cials began blocking shipments of rare-earth
metals destined for Japan. 78 Rare-earth metals span an exotic stretch of
the periodic table, from scandium to lutetium, encompassing elements
that include cerium, samarium, and neodymium in between. In recent
years, these minerals have moved from obscurity to a central place in
many modern technologies, including those that make cars more ei -
cient and clean energy cheaper to produce.
h e Chinese cutof , which Beijing denied was connected to the i sh-
ing boat incident, sent Japanese oi cials into a panic. Hybrids such as
the Toyota Prius use the metals in their bat eries and in the systems that
propel the cars. 79 Wind turbines use them in their magnets; ei cient
lighting ot en depends on them too. Leaders in Tokyo did not want
to take the risk, so days at er the Chinese ban went into ef ect Japan
released the boat captain. It would be months, however, before China
allowed the rare-earth trade to resume. 80
To many observers, this heralded the dawn of a new sort of geo-
politics. Many fear that clean energy, including electric cars, will simply
substitute a new set of security risks for the old ones involving oil.
If manufacturing new energy products requires the use of particular
natural resources, those who control them may be able to use their
position to dominate industries or extract political concessions. h ey
might reserve those resources for their own domestic manufacturers,