What do a smartphone, a hybrid car and a Tomahawk cruise missile have in common? They won’t work without obscure rare earth elements. Scarce materials like europium, neodymium and others are now so in demand that companies and governments are urgently considering unlikely places to mine them, including deep under the sea and, someday, even asteroids.
But there’s another option that has been getting a lot of attention lately: recycling. While there are many challenges ahead, some experts think that recycled rare earths from scrap materials and discarded products may eventually be able to meet up to 40 percent of global demand. That could be a boon for the U.S. and other Western nations, since China now dominates the world market for rare earths and can effectively control their supply and price.
The thing about rare earths is that they aren’t especially rare. Even the two scarcest, thulium and lutetium, are almost 200 times more abundant than gold. Yet the rare earths are difficult to mine because they’re spread out within the Earth’s crust.
“Rare earths are the pepper and salt in many new technological applications,” says Koen Binnemans, a rare earth scientist at the University of Leuven in Belgium. “There are a few applications where no other elements can do the job.”
These metals are valuable because they each have distinctive — and rare — qualities. Neodymium and samarium, for example, are strong magnets, making them crucial for computer hard drives and headphones. Cerium is a powerful catalyst used as an additive to diesel fuel. Europium and terbium are needed for fluorescent light bulbs.
As the demand for rare earths has risen, countries have scrambled to get their share. Right now, China exports more than 80 percent of the world’s supply.
But as people in China move up the economic ladder, they and their families want the same kinds of consumer devices that we have, says Jim Simms, a representative of Molycorp, the only company in the U.S. that mines rare earths. “That alone is driving increased demand.” In July 2010, China decreased its rare earth exports by 70 percent and prices soared. Costs have stabilized since then, but rattled nations are urgently looking beyond China for the valuable metals.
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Source: Scienceline
By Kathryn Free