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05.07.2011 10:07- The production of high-tech gadgets boosts the world demand for rare metals beyond the output rates
© Yutaka Tsutano@flickr.com
Yasuhiro Kato, a geosystem engineer at the University of Tokyo, and his colleagues cataloged some hotspots of rare-earth accumulation on the bed of the Pacific, Nature Geoscience reported.
The researchers measured the elemental composition of over 2,000 seafloor sediments, sampled at depth intervals of around one meter, at 78 sites that cover a large part of the Pacific Ocean.
They found concentrations of rare-earth elements and yttrium as high as 0.2 percent of the mud in the eastern South Pacific, and 0.1 percent near Hawaii. An area of just one square kilometer, surrounding one of the sampling sites, is estimated to hold 25,000 tons of rare earths – providing one-fifth of the current annual demand for these elements.
Annual demand for rare-earth metals was approximately 120,000 tons in 2010 – higher than the world’s current annual production of about 112,000 tons. China, which currently produces some 97 percent of the world’s supply, has recently put stringent caps on the amount available for export, leading to price hikes for these metals. New mines are now being developed around the world, for example in California, Canada, and Australia.
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