The meaning of earth as element
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End-users are at a significant disadvantage by only having one major supplier. The long lead time between discovery and production means there is no quick way to increase supply in the rare earth market. At that point, new sources would be developed. In a normal market, supply reductions would trigger price increases. China also announced they may require imports by 2014 of certain rare earths, some that are deemed “critical” by the U.S. In 20, Chinese exports of rare earths fell, driven predominately by increasing domestic consumption. Japan and the United States are the world’s second and third largest consumers of rare earths. By 2000, China accounted for more than 95% of world rare earth production.Ĭhina is also the dominant consumer of rare earths, which they use mainly in the manufacture of electronics products for domestic use as well as export.
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Because China sold rare earths at very low prices, mines like Molycorp’s Mountain Pass in California and others throughout the world were unable to compete. Where do They Come From?Ĭhina became the world's dominant producer of rare earths in the 1990s. According to Apple, in 2012 over 125 million iPhones were sold worldwide, up from 72 million in 2011. While the amount of rare earths in each phone is very small, the quantity of phones sold each year is impressive. For example, an iPhone uses eight rare earths – for everything from its colored screen, to its speakers, to the miniaturization of the phone’s circuitry. The amount of rare earths used in high tech equipment is nominal but almost always critical to the unit’s performance. With rare earths, a little goes a long way. What is unusual is to find them in quantities significant enough to support economic mineral development. While named rare earths, they are in fact not that rare and are relatively abundant in the Earth's crust. Scandium and yttrium are considered rare earth elements since they tend to occur in the same ore deposits as the lanthanides and exhibit similar chemical properties.
#THE MEANING OF EARTH AS ELEMENT PLUS#
Rare earth elements are a set of seventeen chemical elements in the periodic table, specifically the fifteen lanthanides plus scandium and yttrium. They are the elements that have become irreplaceable to our world of technology owing to their unique magnetic, phosphorescent, and catalytic properties. The Japanese call them “the seeds of technology.” The US Department of Energy calls them “technology metals.” They make possible the high tech world we live in today – everything from the miniaturization of electronics, to the enabling of green energy and medical technologies, to supporting a myriad of essential telecommunications and defense systems. Rare Earth Elements What are Rare Earths?