Cerium(IV) oxide, also known as ceric oxide, ceria, cerium oxide or cerium dioxide, is an oxide of the rare earth metal cerium. It is a pale yellow-white powder with the chemical formula CeO2.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cerium%28IV%29_oxide
**
For instance – this is one thing discovered for the rare earth mineral Cerium -
(from UPI)
Device creates fuel from sunlight
Published: Dec. 23, 2010 at 10:21 PM
The apparatus focuses the sun’s rays onto a metal oxide called ceria to break down water into hydrogen, which can be stored and transported, the BBC reported Thursday.
Ceria has a natural property of emitting oxygen as it heats up and absorbing it as it cools down. If water or carbon dioxide are pumped into the device while the ceria is cooling down the ceria will strip the oxygen from them, liberating either hydrogen or carbon monoxide, the researchers say.
The hydrogen produced could be used to fuel hydrogen fuel cells in cars, while hydrogen mixed with carbon monoxide can create syngas fuels.
http://www.upi.com/Science_News/2010/12/23/Device-creates-fuel-from-sunlight/UPI-52461293160863/
***
The rare earth minerals are used in a lot of the newer technology particularly, green and alternative energy technologies. -
Molycorp shares jump on China rare earth quota cut
CHICAGO | Tue Dec 28, 2010 12:24pm EST
{ . . . }
China produces about 97 percent of rare earth elements, which are used in high-technology, clean energy and other products that exploit their properties for magnetism, luminescence and strength.
(and)
Prices have surged for these minerals, used in everything from Apple Inc’s (AAPL.O) iPods to fluorescent light bulbs, since authorities in Beijing slashed their rare earth exports by 40 percent this summer, saying China needed them for its economic development.
Japanese companies, which bore the brunt of China’s action, have been scrambling to secure reliable supplies of the minerals.
Demand for rare earths is set to more than double in less than five years, from 120,000 to 250,000 tonnes by 2015.
(from)
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6BR2N420101228
***
From wikipedia about one of the rare earth elements -
Neodymium (
/ˌniː.ɵˈdɪmiəm/ NEE-o-DIM-ee-əm) is a chemical element with the symbol Nd and atomic number 60. It is a soft silvery metal which tarnishes in air. Neodymium was discovered in 1885. It is present in significant quantities in the ore minerals monazite and bastnäsite. Neodymium is not found naturally in metallic form or unaccompanied by other lanthanides, and it is usually refined for general use. Although classed as a “rare earth” it is no more rare than cobalt, nickel or copper [2], and is widely distributed in the Earth’s crust. The bulk of the world’s neodymium is presently mined in China.
Neodymium compounds were first commercially used as a glass dye in 1927 and they remain a popular additive in glass. The color, due to the Nd(III) ion, is often a reddish-purple but changes with the type of lighting, due to fluorescent effects. Such neodymium-doped glass is also used in lasers emitting infrared light with the wavelength of 1.054–1.062 micrometers. Neodymium is also used with various other supporting crystals, such as in Nd:YAG lasers, which typically generate 1.064 micrometer light. This is one of the most significant solid-state lasers.
Neodymium’s other chief application is as a free element, used as an alloy constituent of high strength neodymium magnets, the strongest permanent magnets known. These are widely used in such products as microphones, professional loudspeakers, in-ear headphones, and computer hard disks, where low mass, small volume, or strong magnetic fields are required. Larger neodymium magnets are used in high power/weight electric motors (for example in hybrid cars) and generators (for example aircraft and wind turbine generators).[3]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neodymium
***
China Cuts First-Round Rare Earth Export Quotas by 11%
By Bloomberg News – Dec 28, 2010 3:37 PM GMT
China, which accounts for more than 90 percent of world supplies, slashed export quotas by 72 percent in the second half of this year, sparking a surge in prices. . . .
China cut its export quotas for rare earths by 11 percent in the first round of permits for 2011, threatening to extend a global shortage of the minerals needed for smartphones, hybrid cars and guided missiles.
(etc.)
The latest move to curb exports may further exacerbate tensions with the U.S., which last week said it may file a World Trade Organization complaint over restraints on supplies of the minerals. Rare earths are 17 chemically similar elements including neodymium, cerium and lanthanum that are used in the production of electronics.
(from)
***
Enough Project raises hard questions about modern electronic components
The last few months have seen a surge in reports about the global supply of rare-earth metals like neodymium and dysprosium, which are critical for wind turbines, lithium batteries and modern circuitry. China’s control of the market is seen as particularly worrying, especially given the recent spat with Japan which saw China denying its neighbor access to its exports for a period of time.
(etc.)
**
This is from an opinion page article in the NY Times. It describes what is happening as China shifts its focus to domestic markets -
China and Intellectual Property
Published: December 23, 2010
( . . . )
In 2005, the China National Railway Signal and Communication Corporation invited Germany’s Siemens to join in building trains for the Beijing-Tianjin high-speed railway. Most of the technology came from Siemens, which trained 1,000 C.N.R. technicians in Germany.
But most of the trains were built in China. For the next project — the Beijing-Shanghai high-speed rail — the Ministry of Transportation decided it wanted domestic technology, and C.N.R. bumped Siemens out. CSR Corporation, another Chinese train builder, did the same with Kawasaki Heavy Industries of Japan.
China’s attempt to move up the tech ladder is natural. Many countries in history have pursued technological progress by first trying to piggyback on foreign inventions — tweaking and improving — before blazing their own trails. Still, intellectual property misappropriation cannot be a government policy goal, especially in a country the size of China, which can flood world markets with ill-begotten high-tech products.
(from)
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/24/opinion/24fri1.html?src=twrhp
page A22 of the New York edition.
***
From a recent robotics show -
Ilshim Global Company Ltd. – Booth #25716 – Windoro is a flat, autonmous window cleaning robot that uses water, detergent and rotating pads to clean glass while navigating with obstacle sensors. Windoro consists of two parts held together by neodymium magnets, which simultaneously clean both sides of a window pane. Contact Ryu, Man Hun at ryumh@isgmicro.com.
http://www.ecnmag.com/News/2010/12/CES/Robotics-Techzone/
**
Another quick example of current uses for some of the rare earth minerals – this one described on techtree.com India -
Logitech Unveils S715i iPod Dock
Nachiket Mhatre, Dec 07, 2010 1743 hrs IST
Equipped with a remote and 8hr battery lifeLogitech has introduced a new iPod dock S715i with inbuilt speakers. The dock sports two squawkers using neodymium magnets for tighter mid-range and half-inch neodymium tweeters for sharper highs.
(etc.)
http://www.techtree.com/India/News/Logitech_Unveils_S715i_iPod_Dock/551-113705-581.html
**
US Department of Energy – December 2010
Critical Materials Strategy
http://www.energy.gov/news/documents/criticalmaterialsstrategy.pdf
Lists the Fourteen Critical Materials among them, Nine Rare Earth Elements –
Chapter 2 reviews the supply chains of four components used in clean energy technologies:
• Permanent magnets (used in wind turbines and electric vehicles)
• Advanced batteries (used in electric vehicles)
• Thin-film semiconductors (used in photovoltaic power systems)
• Phosphors (used in high-efficiency lighting systems)
These components were selected for two reasons. First, the deployment of the clean energy technologies that use them is projected to increase, perhaps significantly, in the short, medium and long term. Second, each uses significant quantities of rare earth metals or other key materials.
Chapter 3 presents historical data on supply, demand and prices.
Data is provided for 14 materials, including 9 rare earth elements (yttrium, lanthanum, cerium, praseodymium, neodymium, samarium, europium, terbium and dysprosium) as well as indium, gallium, tellurium, cobalt and lithium.
(and)
Chapter 8 presents “criticality assessments”— analyses that combine the importance of a material to the clean energy economy and supply risk with respect to that material.
The analytical approach is adapted from a methodology developed by the National Academy of Sciences (NAS 2008). The analyses may be useful in priority-setting for research and other purposes.
Applying this methodology to the materials listed above, terbium, neodymium, dysprosium, yttrium, europium and indium have greatest short-term “criticality” (Figure ES-1). All of these materials except indium remain critical in the medium term (Figure ES-2).
(from)
http://www.energy.gov/news/documents/criticalmaterialsstrategy.pdf
***
There is a description of some current uses of the rare earth metal Yttrium,
found in this genuinely annoying “don’t copy any of this material or these links site” 2003 webpage and its contents paid for by the taxpayers of the US -
Operated by the University of California for the Department of Energy
Using Sources from CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics and the American Chemical Society
It says – uses of Yttrium include giving the red color to television sets . . . hundreds of thousands of pounds are now used in this application.
microwave filters by the yttrium-iron garnets made from rare earth yttrium oxide. It is also used for metal alloys, for rendering certain metals and alloys, making lasers, in ceramics and glass.
http://periodic.lanl.gov/elements/39.html
(it is a dot gov site – I don’t believe it – now, that is disgusting the way it is set up so that the information cannot be acquired from the page. no telling how many millions of dollars paid for every bit of that . . . damn them.)
**
From Wikipedia – about rare earth metal Yttrium -
Yttrium ( /ˈɪtriəm/ IT-ree-əm) is a chemical element with symbol Y and atomic number 39. It is a silvery-metallic transition metal chemically similar to the lanthanoids and has historically been classified as a rare earth element.[2] Yttrium is almost always found combined with the lanthanoids in rare earth minerals and is never found in nature as a free element. Its only stable isotope, 89Y, is also its only naturally occurring isotope.
The most important use of yttrium is in making phosphors, such as the red ones used in television cathode ray tube displays and in LEDs.[5] Other uses include the production of electrodes, electrolytes, electronic filters, lasers and superconductors; various medical applications; and as traces in various materials to enhance their properties. Yttrium has no known biological role, and exposure to yttrium compounds can cause lung disease in humans.[6]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yttrium
**
Here is one of the reasons this should be so important – that rare earth metals and resources be not hindered in the world production capacities -
Computing
A New Superconductor
Researchers investigate why iron arsenide materials become superconducting at relatively high temperatures.
The new material’s chemical structure makes it particularly exciting. It contains oxides of rare earth metals sandwiched between layers of iron arsenide.
(from)
http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/20867/
As mentioned under the graphic in the article -
No resistance: New superconductors contain alternating layers of iron arsenide (orange and red) and rare earth metal oxides (blue and gray) doped with fluorine (green). Iron arsenide compounds become superconducting at relatively high temperatures of 55 K, and researchers are now beginning to decipher their superconducting mechanism.
Credit: Hideo Hosono, Tokyo Institute of Technology
(also from the second page of this article – describes why this is crucial to the development of superconducting materials for final applications – )
The new superconductors could also have another crucial advantage, says David Christen, who leads superconductor research at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. While cuprate power cables have to be fabricated as specially designed flat tapes, it might be easier to make wires from iron arsenide semiconductors. “These materials could be more practical than cuprates if it turns out that they’re easier and less expensive to make,” Christen says.
Researchers are also hoping that iron arsenides will help unlock the mystery of how high-temperature superconductors work. That will be key for designing materials with even higher critical temperatures. In superconductors that work at very low temperatures, such as niobium and lead, electrons form pairs below the critical temperature. Atoms or defects in the crystal do not have the energy needed to break the pair and deflect the electrons. So the electron pair zips around the material unimpeded, giving rise to superconductivity. But this pairing theory does not hold for high-temperature copper-oxygen materials.
(etc.)
(from)
http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/20867/
***
Also from technology review -
http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/26538/?mod=related
Where it states -
Rare earths are comprised of 17 elements, such as terbium, which is used to make green phosphors for flat-panel TVs, lasers, and high-efficiency fluorescent lamps. Neodymium is key to the permanent magnets used to make high-efficiency electric motors.
Although well over 90 percent of the minerals are produced in China, they are found in many places around the world, and, in spite of their name, are actually abundant in the earth’s crust (the name is a hold-over from a 19th-century convention). In recent years, low-cost Chinese production and environmental concerns have caused suppliers outside of China to shut down operations.
(also this from the last page – the article has a lot of interesting information about how Tesla motors and other electric car manufacturers are solving the problem without relying on rare earth metals for their consumer products – )
GE Global Research, in Niskayuna, New York, is pursuing nanocomposites similar to those being developed in Delaware, also with ARPA-E funding. Using methods developed in-house, the project aims to build a new material through the alignment of nanopowders.
“These materials are intrinsically unstable,” so controlling their assembly is at the frontier of nanoscale manufacturing processes, says Luana Iorio, a manager at GE’s High Temperature Alloys and Processing Laboratory, who leads the research.
GE estimates its nanocomposites could deliver 35 percent greater magnetic strength than today’s best permanent magnets, while using 40 percent of the rare earths, by volume. Within two years, Iorio hopes, the project will be able to create samples of the new material a few centimeters in diameter.
Yet since it may take years for these efforts to bear fruit, the hunt for non-Chinese sources of the minerals is attracting attention in the near term. In California, Molycorp Minerals is looking to reopen rare-earth mines that closed in 2002, amidst low pricing and environmental concerns.
In recent weeks, bills have been floated in the U.S. House and Senate aimed at reviving the rare-earth supply chain in the U.S., including mining, refining, and manufacturing. A third bill, in the House, is narrower, focusing on offering loan guarantees to restart mining.
http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/26538/?mod=related
Article Date – October 15, 2010
***
Terbium -
(from wikipedia)
Terbium ( /ˈtɜrbiəm/ TUR-bee-əm) is a chemical element with the symbol Tb and atomic number 65. It is a silvery-white rare earth metal that is malleable, ductile and soft enough to be cut with a knife. Terbium is never found in nature as a free element, but it is contained in many minerals, including cerite, gadolinite, monazite, xenotime and euxenite.
Terbium is used to dope calcium fluoride, calcium tungstate and strontium molybdate, materials that are used in solid-state devices, and as a crystal stabilizer of fuel cells which operate at elevated temperatures.
As a component of Terfenol-D (an alloy which expands and contracts in magnetic field more than any other alloy), terbium is of use in actuators, in naval sonar systems and sensors.
The largest consumer of the world’s terbium supply is in “green” phosphors (which are usually yellow). Terbium oxide is in fluorescent lamps and TV tubes. Terbium “green” phosphors (which fluoresce a brilliant lemon-yellow) are combined with divalent europium blue phosphors and trivalent europium red phosphors to provide “trichromatic” lighting technology, a high-efficiency white light for standard illumination uses in indoor lighting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terbium
**
Technology Review also included this article on October 29, 2010 which describes not only the amount of these rare earth minerals abounding in the earth’s crust but also some of the main difficulties arising out of any efforts to get them from the ground, process them and be competitive in it -
http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/26655/
But Ames Lab’s Geschneidner notes that one major source of cost in the separation process can’t be eliminated–the fact that it simply takes a long time. Milled rock is shaken again and again in a mixture of solvents to separate the elements by weight; depending on the ultimate purity that’s required, this must be done 10,000 to 100,000 times. The result is then sold as a concentrate or treated to produce rare-earth metal oxides.
(that needs a solution that works better – and this describes the amount of rare earth mineral resources – )
Contrary to their name, rare-earth metals are abundant in the Earth’s crust, and significant reserves are concentrated in the United States, Australia, Brazil, and other countries. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, there are 13 million tons of extractable rare earths in the United States, 5.4 million in Australia, and 19 million in Russia and neighboring countries. In 2009, China had 36 million.
(here is what is produced as an environmental risk by-product wherever the rare earth minerals are mined along with the other environmental problems produced during other phases of the processing, which are not described in this particular article – but are discussed elsewhere on public databases.)
Several factors make purification of rare earths complicated. First, the 17 elements all tend to occur together in the same mineral deposits, and because they have similar properties, it’s difficult to separate them from one another.
They also tend to occur in deposits with radioactive elements, particularly thorium and uranium. Those elements can become a threat if the “tailings,” the slushy waste product of the first step in separating rare earths from the rocks they’re found in, are not dealt with properly.
Mountain Pass went into decline in the 1990s when Chinese producers began to undercut the mine on price at the same time as it had safety issues with tailings. When the Mountain Pass mine was operating at full capacity, it produced 850 gallons of waste saltwater containing these radioactive elements every hour, every day of the year.
The tailings were transported down an eleven-mile pipeline to evaporation ponds. In 1998, Mountain Pass, which was then owned by a subsidiary of oil company Unocal, had a problem with tailing leaks when the pipeline burst; four years later, the company’s permit for storing the tailings lapsed.
(from)
http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/26655/
October 29, 2010, Technology Review, excerpts by author – K. Bourzac
***
A little further down the article from wikipedia about Terbium yields the why of some difficulties and environmental concerns processing rare earth minerals for commercial uses – )
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terbium
Production
Crushed terbium-containing minerals are treated with hot concentrated sulfuric acid to produce water-soluble sulfates of rare earths. The acidic filtrates are partially neutralized with caustic soda to pH 3-4. Thorium precipitates out of solution as hydroxide and is removed. After that the solution is treated with ammonium oxalate to convert rare earths into their insoluble oxalates. The oxalates are converted to oxides by annealing. The oxides are dissolved in nitric acid that excludes one of the main components, cerium, whose oxide is insoluble in HNO3. Terbium is separated as a double salt with ammonium nitrate by crystallization.[6]
The most efficient separation routine for terbium salt from the rare-earth salt solution is ion exchange. In this process, rare-earth ions are sorbed onto suitable ion-exchange resin by exchange with hydrogen, ammonium or cupric ions present in the resin. The rare earth ions are then selectively washed out by suitable complexing agent. As with other rare earths, terbium metal is produced by reducing the anhydrous chloride or fluoride with calcium metal. Calcium and tantalum impurities can be removed by vacuum remelting, distillation, amalgam formation or zone melting.[6]
Applications
Terbium is used as a Dopant in calcium fluoride, calcium tungstate and strontium molybdate, materials that are used in solid-state devices, and as a crystal stabilizer of fuel cells which operate at elevated temperatures, together with ZrO2.[2]
Terbium is also used in alloys and in the production of electronic devices. As a component of Terfenol-D, terbium is of use in actuators, in naval sonar systems, sensors, in the SoundBug device (its first commercial application), and other magnetomechanical devices. Terfenol-D is an alloy that expands or contracts in the presence of a magnetic field. It has the highest magnetostriction of any alloy.[11]
Terbium oxide is used in green phosphors in fluorescent lamps and color TV tubes. Sodium terbium borate is used in solid state devices. The brilliant fluorescence allows terbium to be used as a probe in biochemistry, where it somewhat resembles calcium in its behavior. Terbium “green” phosphors (which fluoresce a brilliant lemon-yellow) are combined with divalent europium blue phosphors and trivalent europium red phosphors to provide the “trichromatic” lighting technology which is by far the largest consumer of the world’s terbium supply. Trichromatic lighting provides much higher light output for a given amount of electrical energy than does incandescent lighting.[2]
(from)
Wikipedia entry for Terbium (rare earth element)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terbium
**
Mastery of rare-earth elements vital to America’s security
March 16, 2010
Mastery of rare-earth elements vital to America’s security
Rare-earth elements are critical components in the great majority of America’s high-tech commercial and military products. Their vital role in our nation’s economic and national security was underscored by today’s hearing of the Investigations & Oversight Subcommittee of the House Committee on Science and Technology, which was devoted entirely to the topic.
To optimize the use of rare earths in current and future products, scientists combine rare earths with other elements to create alloys intended for specific purposes. Yet the United States and other nations have ceded much of this alloying knowledge to China, said Karl A. Gschneidner Jr., a senior metallurgist at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Ames Laboratory.
(and also found in this article – )
Global sales of neodymium-iron-boron magnet products total $4.1 billion. Such magnets include the rare-earth element, neodymium, and they can be found in a wide array of electronic and electrical components.
Gschneidner cautioned members of the Congressional panel that “rare-earth research in the USA on mineral extraction, rare-earth separation, processing of the oxides into metallic alloys and other useful forms, substitution, and recycling is virtually zero.”
(etc.)
Provided by Ames Laboratory (news : web)
http://www.physorg.com/news187978951.html
**
This article from Hitachi (also on phys.org) describes the efforts Japan is making to recycle the rare earth metals in order to have them available -
Hitachi develops recycling technologies for rare earth metals
December 16, 2010Hitachi today announced that it has developed technologies for recycling rare earth magnets from hard disk drive (HDD) motors and air conditioners and other compressors. Specifically, Hitachi developed machinery to separate and collect rare earth magnets from end-of-life products, and successfully extracted rare earths from rare earth magnets using an experimental dry process. Going forward, Hitachi aims to commence full recycling operations by 2013 after calculating overall recycling costs and recovery ratio.
(and this describes how extensively rare earth minerals are used in materials, commercial electronics, factory equipment and consumer products -)
Rare earth magnets are alloyed metals consisting of roughly two thirds of iron and one thirds of rare earth metals, with neodymium added for a stronger magnetic force than the one in ordinary magnets, and dysprosium added to enhance heat resistance.
These materials are essential in products that contribute to a low-carbon society such as HDDs used in personal computers and others, IT equipments, high-performance motors for IT factory automation, wind power generators, home appliances like air conditioners that excel in energy-saving performance and motors for hybrid cars.
Meanwhile, approximately 97% of rare earth production volume comes from the People’s Republic of China, and given as a fact that developing alternative materials is time requiring matter, the recycling of rare earths from rare earth magnets in end-of-life products are expected to secure rare earths stably.
http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-12-hitachi-recycling-technologies-rare-earth.html
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Regards
Clive
Perhaps you can – we need more people knowledgeable and capable with green building concepts. It is great to hear that is important to you and that you are doing something about it.
Good to know about your efforts.
Thanks so much –
cricketdiane