#eco #technology
#eco #technology
Originally shared by Wayne Radinsky
"Neodymium is no rarer than copper or nickel and quite evenly distributed throughout the world's crust. While China produces 90% of the global market's neodymium, only 30% of the world's deposits are located there. Arguably, what makes it, and cerium, scarce enough to be profitable are the hugely hazardous and toxic process needed to extract them from ore and to refine them into usable products. For example, cerium is extracted by crushing mineral mixtures and dissolving them in sulphuric and nitric acid, and this has to be done on a huge industrial scale, resulting in a vast amount of poisonous waste as a byproduct. It could be argued that China's dominance of the rare earth market is less about geology and far more about the country's willingness to take an environmental hit that other nations shy away from."
The neodymium and cerium used in tech products start in mines in Inner Mongolia, the province of northern China that borders Mongolia, such as the Bayan Obo mines just north of Baotou. Then they are processed in Baotou, and the "tailings," the toxic waste, are dumped in a "tailings pond", a big toxic lake.
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150402-the-worst-place-on-earth
Originally shared by Wayne Radinsky
"Neodymium is no rarer than copper or nickel and quite evenly distributed throughout the world's crust. While China produces 90% of the global market's neodymium, only 30% of the world's deposits are located there. Arguably, what makes it, and cerium, scarce enough to be profitable are the hugely hazardous and toxic process needed to extract them from ore and to refine them into usable products. For example, cerium is extracted by crushing mineral mixtures and dissolving them in sulphuric and nitric acid, and this has to be done on a huge industrial scale, resulting in a vast amount of poisonous waste as a byproduct. It could be argued that China's dominance of the rare earth market is less about geology and far more about the country's willingness to take an environmental hit that other nations shy away from."
The neodymium and cerium used in tech products start in mines in Inner Mongolia, the province of northern China that borders Mongolia, such as the Bayan Obo mines just north of Baotou. Then they are processed in Baotou, and the "tailings," the toxic waste, are dumped in a "tailings pond", a big toxic lake.
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150402-the-worst-place-on-earth
Comments
Post a Comment