Title: A Scarcity of Rare Metals Is Hindering Green Technologies - Yale E360
Headings: A Scarcity of Rare Metals Is Hindering Green Technologies
A Scarcity of Rare Metals Is Hindering Green Technologies
In 2011, the average price of ‘rare earth’ metals shot up by as much as 750 percent.
A Belgian company now recycles 350,000 tons of e-waste a year, including photovoltaic cells.
The onus has to be put on the manufacturers to recover and recycle their own products, one researcher notes.
One approach is to find alternative materials that don’t need so many critical elements.
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Content: When it comes to recycling, anything is possible,” says Kuehr. “ It’s a question of whether it’s economic.” One of the hardest steps in e-waste recycling is simply getting the battery or other critical-metal-rich components out of the larger device or machine. This is a menial but intricate task, which is often handed over to low-paid workers in places like China or Nigeria. In the Guiyu area of southern China, for example, more than 100,000 people work to take apart e-waste, boiling up circuit boards to remove the plastic and then leaching the metals with acid, at great risk to the environment and themselves. Uncontrolled burning leads to contaminated groundwater, and one study found elevated levels of lead in children living in Guiyu. Japan is at the forefront of efforts to automate these processes so they can be done economically and safely by machines, says King. The onus has to be put on the manufacturers to recover and recycle their own products, one researcher notes. Even more important than technology, says Apelian, is policy and education. In a study of the U.S. recycling rates of about 20 products, from plastic to metal, the one with the highest rate of recovery is lead-acid batteries, used primarily in cars.