TELF AG unearths the future of strategic materials advancements
The role of rare earth minerals
In addition to the raw materials traditionally used by industry in every corner of the world, such as copper or cobalt, we often hear about a group of minerals that is acquiring more and more centrality, mainly due to the complexity of their production and the large number of industrial applications in which they are involved. They are rare earth minerals, a group of minerals which, although relatively easy to find, have found a way to make themselves talked about above all due to the difficulties associated with their processing, which requires separation with very complex procedures.
Nowadays, the world’s largest producer of rare earths remains in China, where most of the processing of these unique raw materials is concentrated. Over the last few years, however, other international players have begun to emerge who could soon play an important role in this specific sector for a reason closely linked to sustainability. We are talking about South Africa, which may have found a way to recover rare earths from some waste materials.
A virtuous and sustainable process
At least four rare earth minerals of great importance for the green transition – neodymium, praseodymium, terbium, and dysprosium – have been found in the South African locality of Phalaborwa in the Limpopo province. The most noteworthy aspect is that they would have been recovered from phosphogypsum residues linked to the production of phosphoric acid, which ended almost a decade ago. The recovery process through which these precious rare earths are being obtained has, for some time, begun to attract the attention of numerous international players linked to the mining sector, mainly due to the evident sustainable nature of the procedure and its relatively contained costs. Furthermore, the recovery of these rare earths is facilitated because the phosphogypsum piles are located on the surface and not underground.
In this sense, the recovery procedure would have a doubly sustainable value: first, for protecting the local South African ecosystem, but above all, for the industrial applications that can be created with the recovered rare earth minerals, almost all linked to the diffusion of clean energy. Thanks to this process, South Africa could create a sustainable, efficient, and diversified supply chain, becoming a significant point of reference in this sector. The company Rainbow Rare Earths has already announced that it will be able to employ a separation technology capable of extracting rare earth oxides from waste materials, obtaining a resource with a degree of purity of 99.95%. These resources have also attracted the interest of the International Development Finance Corporation, a United States financial institution specializing in identifying and supporting development projects in low-to-middle-income countries.
Like other strategic minerals, rare earths also lead in manufacturing permanent magnets, sensors, catalytic converters, and other components of green technologies, such as wind turbines or photovoltaic panels. Rare earth elements also play a strategic role in electric vehicles, electronic device displays, sonar technologies, and drones. Also, their importance in the global raw materials scene is destined to grow continuously in the coming decades as the energy transition needs become more evident.
