In order to reveal the changing trend of lanthanum material flow in China and describe its trade pattern, this paper constructs a dynamic material flow analysis framework for lanthanum that simulates the flow of lanthanum in the whole life cycle and analyzes the flow of lanthanum in China in terms of inventory, and supply and demand from 1990 to 2018,. The results show that: 1) 96% of China's lanthanum supply came from domestic mining, of which 77% came from Bayan Obo ores and bastnaesite ores; 2) lanthanum has a wide variety of functional materials, and the most of the 28-year cumulative amount of lanthanum were used in petroleum cracking catalysts that consumed 47% of the total application of lanthanum; 3) from 1990 to 2018, China exported 292,000 tons of lanthanum, mainly smelting and separating products, to other countries; and 4) between 1990 and 2018, China's lanthanum was generally in excess but a small amount of insufficient supply occurred in 2013-2017 due to the significant export of lanthanum oxide and the growth of downstream applications, which was conducive to reducing inventory and promoting supply and demand balance. Based on these results this study suggests vigorously developing new materials and expanding new applications based on consolidating existing downstream consumption. In addition, to prevent environmental pollution, it is necessary to establish a recovery mechanism for waste petroleum cracking catalysts as soon as possible and formulate relevant laws and regulations.

lanthanum  /  rare earth  /  material flow analysis  /  supply and demand relationship