Rare Earth metals are becoming ever more important to technology in recent years and the need will continue to grow in the future. Mobile phones are a prime example of the many modern technologies which require the use of several rare Earth metals in order to improve the various features that it has.
Modern smartphones use indium in the touchscreen, gold in various micro electrical components and neodymium magnets in the speakers, receivers and various motors; not to mention the several other metals used to produce the vibrant colours in screen as shown in the image (shown right). Another element lanthanum, is used in the new Toyota Prius batteries and is proven to be twice as efficient as regular lithium/cobalt batteries.
However, these elements are running out, and as less than 1% of all rare earth metals produced are recycled, action must be done to recycle what we have already used. This is realistically our planet’s best approach to tackle this problem as mining in space is far from reality and may not be reliable.
The EU has funded a project called SUSMAGPRO that aims to tackle this problem by funding various institutions to develop a recycling supply chain for rare Earth metals. In total there are 19 different institutions that are part of the project, but the University of Birmingham was the one which was allocated the most money (€3.9 million). This money will be used to start a recycling facility which focuses on magnets made of neodymium, boron and iron, often found in hard disk drives, wind turbine generators and many household appliances, including mobile phones.
The process that will be used at this facility is a relatively new process developed by Birmingham University themselves, and uses hydrogen to break up the magnetic metal alloys into powder. The hydrogen preferentially enters the rare earth metal, so expands its volume, resulting in a fine powder being produced. The powder is then easily removed by screening and can be processed directly back into new magnets. It is predicted that the facility will be able to produce 20 tonnes of recycled magnets a year which is a considerable amount based on the fact that the magnets in smartphones are very small. Previous methods of extracting rare Earth metals included disassembly and removal of the magnet but this new process saves time, labor, and in the long term, money.
In conclusion, I believe that recycling rare Earth metals is essential for the future of technology and they should be preserved at all cost, as their properties hugely contribute to the increase in efficiency of new products.
The Researcher 