I wonder why they call Lithium a ‘rare earth element(REE)’?
Most of these miracle electric cars, which aren’t miracles at all once you read the fine print, or drive one — Use a rare earth metal “Lithium” for their batteries and other rare earth metals for their drive motors. Among the rare earths that would be most affected in a shortage is neodymium, the key component of an alloy used to make the high-power, lightweight magnets for electric motors of hybrid cars, such as the Prius, Honda Insight and Ford Focus, as well as in generators for wind turbines.
Dysprosium and terbium are also used to make very powerful but lightweight magnets; terbium is also used to make computer monitors. Ceramics and stainless steels are among the other ‘common materials’ that make use of REEs. Not just for motors and generators, REES are used in everything: glass polishing, ceramics, automotive catalytic converters, computer monitors, lighting, televisions and pharmaceuticals, to name a few products making use of REEs.
Most of the batteries for electric car use are either nickel-metal hydride, or lithium-ion batteries. Did you note the part about the windmill turbines? So it’s just not cars, it’s the windmill scam as well. The REE neodymium is used to make the rare earth magnets in motors and generators.
And all this to avoid the sticky issue of why not just build some nuclear power plants.
Wean vehicles off of one resource — petroleum — and get them hooked on other much more scarce resources, lithium and neodymium. That’s what some critics have raised about switching over to electric cars that use lithium-ion batteries, since the U.S. imports most of its lithium from Chile and Argentina, while Bolivia has enough deposits to become a major lithium provider. But amid all the hubbub about the looming lithium squeeze, another resource trend is taking shape that has the potential to drive some big changes in advanced battery and vehicle technology: a group of metals known as rare earth elements, or REE.
According to Lux Research analyst Jacob Grose, “Rare earths are used very much in nickel metal hydride batteries,” like the Toyota Prius and Honda Insight. “Even though…hybrids use only a fraction of the worldwide output of these metals, if there is a shortage and prices rise, it will definitely lead to cost increases in today’s hybrids.”
Currently China controls about 90+% of the world’s REE markets, and one of the techniques that China uses is to prevent the shipments of the materials, but allow the shipments of the finished goods. To avoid the bans, motor and generator manufacturers move their operations to China, and their jobs.
But isn’t that Obama’s goal, drive up costs so much that everyone has to walk or ride bicycles? In the George Orwell movie “1984” people had bicycle powered electric generators in their apartments, so they could lite up one light bulb to see, if they could get someone to pedal the stationary bicycle.
Did you know that pound for pound, batteries are about 1/20 the energy of a gallon of gasoline? And did you know that the world has sufficient uranium for 100’s of years of use?
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