Australian rare earths to a magnet in a motor

Australia · Mount Weld, Western Australia detenuto da Lynas Rare Earths (Minatore)

Mining a natural concentrate

Open-pit mining of deeply weathered carbonatite. Weathering has already done much of the concentrating work over geological time.

Perché qui: Carbonatite pipes are rare, and ones with a thick weathered cap are rarer still.

Australia · Mount Weld concentrator detenuto da Lynas Rare Earths (Minatore)

Flotation to a concentrate

Milled and floated to a mineral concentrate at roughly 40% rare-earth oxide.

Che fine ha fatto il resto: 980 tonnes of tailings, on site, in Australia.

Perché qui: Concentrate at the mine, always.

Malaysia · Fremantle to Kuantan, Malaysia detenuto da Lynas Malaysia (Raffinatore)

First border crossing

Concentrate is shipped to Malaysia, where the plant that cracks it was built.

Perché qui: The cracking and separation plant was permitted and built here rather than in Australia — a decision about chemistry, cost and permitting that took years and remains contested.

Malaysia · Kuantan, Pahang detenuto da Lynas Malaysia (Chimico)

Cracking it open with acid

Roasted with concentrated sulfuric acid to break the mineral apart, then leached. Thorium and uranium that came with the ore have to be separated and managed here.

Che fine ha fatto il resto: The radioactive residue is the reason this step is hard to permit anywhere, and the reason so few countries have it.

Perché qui: Because someone was willing to build it and see it through.

Malaysia · Separation plant detenuto da Lynas Malaysia (Raffinatore)

Hundreds of stages to tell them apart

Solvent extraction through hundreds of mixer-settler stages, exploiting differences in ionic radius so small they are almost invisible. Out come separated oxides: neodymium-praseodymium, lanthanum, cerium.

Che fine ha fatto il resto: Cerium and lanthanum come out too, in larger quantities than anyone wants them. Surplus light rare earths are the industry's structural problem.

Perché qui: This is the hardest step in the chain and the one with the fewest operators worldwide.

China · Metal and alloy plants detenuto da Metal and magnet makers (Produttore)

Oxide to metal to alloy

The oxide is reduced to metal by molten-salt electrolysis, then strip-cast with iron and boron into a rapidly-quenched NdFeB alloy ribbon.

Perché qui: Metal-making capacity outside China is very small. This is the step a Western mine cannot yet route around.

China · Ningbo or Ganzhou detenuto da Magnet manufacturer (Produttore)

Making the magnet

Hydrogen decrepitation, jet milling to a few microns, pressing in a magnetic field to align the grains, sintering, machining, and a nickel-copper-nickel coating so it does not corrode. Dysprosium or terbium is diffused into the grain boundaries so it survives heat.

Che fine ha fatto il resto: Machining swarf is recycled internally — magnet scrap is one of the few genuinely closed loops in this industry.

Perché qui: Roughly 30% of a sintered magnet's mass is rare earth. This is where the ore finally becomes a component.

Germany · Motor and vehicle plants detenuto da Motor and vehicle manufacturers (Produttore)

Into a traction motor

1.6 tonnes of magnet is on the order of two thousand car traction motors, or the generator of a single large offshore wind turbine.

Perché qui: Four countries, three oceans, five processing steps — from one tonne of Australian rock to the thing that makes an electric car move.