We're Running Out of These Elements — Here's How

Whether it's your phone, laptop or TV, you're watching this video about a miracle of technology. As much as it may seem, these devices are not made of literal magic, but of materials with unique and surprising properties, however special they may be. You won't be surprised to learn that it's also hard to find enough of them—we're consuming them faster than ever today, and researchers are starting to worry that we're

running

out of the idea that we can deplete our supply of certain important

elements

. It's called criticality and it's already starting to shape what the technology of the future could look like.

We're going to look at a bunch of reasons why certain items could become scarce, but the most obvious is that t

here

simply wasn't much to begin with. A great example of this is indium, which is found two rows below aluminum on the periodic table. Yes, aluminum is more than a million times more abundant in the Earth's crust. Up to 75% of the world's indium production is used to produce indium tin oxide, which has the remarkable property of conducting electricity while remaining completely transparent. It's a key component in LCD and touch screens, which is why you're probably looking at or looking through something Indian right now.

It is also used in solar panels and for the ball bearings of the Formula One racing cars the world is planning. We will be building a lot of solar panels and LCD screens in the next few years, so we will need a large supply of indium, which is a problem; In fact, some estimates suggest that our demand for the element may begin to exceed production by 2030, which will unfortunately increase. Production is easier said than done. Indium is primarily mined as a byproduct of zinc mining, but it is still rare, with an abundance of between 1 and 100 parts per million in zinc ore, so a large increase in indium production means an excess of zinc, whether we need more. of that metal or not, instead of producing more indium, another option is to simply use less, since we are not likely to give up televisions and solar panels, which means finding an alternative for screens that could mean antimony, but the criticality of that element is even higher than that of indium, so it is not a great substitute.

Solar panel manufacturers could replace indium with graphene or carbon nanotubes, but these advanced materials are still experimental and very expensive. Not only do very scarce items face supply risks, but some materials are in great abundance. but low concentration examples of this problem are the rare earth

elements

, of dubious names, which consist mainly of elements of the lanthanide series. Scientists initially discovered them as trace elements from minerals that themselves were very rare, giving rise to the idea that they were among the rarest elements on Earth. Today we know that is not actually true. Cerium, for example, is as abundant as copper and even the rarest rare earths are 200 times more common than gold.

What makes them rare is that, unlike many other metals, they are unfinished. In concentrated deposits in the Earth's crust that are easy to find and extract, rare earths have the highest criticality of any element not only because they are extremely difficult to extract but because they are also used in an incredible variety of products such as cerium. the only element besides iron that produces sparks when struck. If you've ever used a flint to light a fire or a lighter instead of a match, you've probably used an alloy of the two called Syrian ferrocerium, which is valuable because it produces sparks at an exceptionally low temperature that makes things like lighters.

Easier to use The unusual properties of rare earths mean they appear in all kinds of modern technology. Up to 50% of your smartphone's camera glass, for example, is made from lanthanum. Neodymium magnets are used to rotate. hard drives and DVD players grease it with trio, europium and terbium create the colors on your TV screen and LED lights. A big part of today's white technology is so different from that of a century ago is that we have learned how to effectively extract and use these exotic materials. It's not the only reason an item may have a high criticality: a material may be relatively abundant but difficult to extract safely and ethically.

As governments around the world become more concerned about the environmental and human impacts of mining, they may create regulations that further decrease supply. of a critical element, these broader limitations can mean that even if a particular substance is safe, it faces restrictions based on the byproducts of its extraction, a good example being monazite, a mineral rich in rare earth elements, after processing , monocytes can contain up to 70% cerium and lanthanum allows the creation of all the products we just talked about, but monocytes also contain thorium, uranium and radium, which are highly regulated radioactive elements. The cost and difficulty of dealing with these toxic byproducts led to the closure of the United States' only rare earth element processing facility in the In the early 2000s, another example is arsenic, which is a byproduct of copper and gold mining in the form of gallium arsenide.

It is a key component in the manufacturing of semiconductors that are the basis of basically all modern technology. Arsenic is also used in the pressure treatment process. like what can be used to build a deck or a mailbox, it is also poisonous and can cause cancer, meaning it has not been mined in the United States since 1985; That's the tension in this kind of criticality, some of our most important technologies depend on some pretty nasty stuff right now, t

here

are people in places willing to do that dirty work, but there's no guarantee that this will always be true.

The last major cause of criticality is what researchers call vulnerability to supply constraint. It is the idea that there are people and policies behind it. everything we do and that those factors are inherently unpredictable for many items, it's not just that they are incredibly rare or dangerous to produce, but that production occurs in very few places, which, if you think about it, is a natural consequence of our two previous factors. If a resource is very rare, there are probably only a couple of places in the world where it can be easily found, and as more countries regulate the mining industry, there are fewer and fewer places willing to mine if something happens to restrict the resource. production in those few. places, whether deliberate or not, the global supply of a critical element could be threatened, the world first began to understand this about 50 years ago, when what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo went through a period of serious civil unrest At that time the Democratic Republic of the Congo was the leading nation in the world.

The main supplier of cobalt and the nation's unrest led to a sharp drop in exports. Today, the country still supplies about two-thirds of the world's cobalt. It is used in many things, but the most important by far is the construction of lithium-ion batteries. the battery technology that powers our phones and laptops, but is also used in many modern electric cars. If you reader, cars are going to be a great tool in the fight against climate change, which means that the effort will depend in part on the stability of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Cobalt is not the only example that at the Geology and chemistry don't care about national borders, but because of how mineral deposits are often concentrated, one nation can end up controlling most of a particular element.

The United States, for example, produces 73 percent of the world's helium. which is essential for the use of MRI machines. China provides 95% of the gallium used in LED lights, as well as about 70 percent of the arsenic-antimony and all rare earths. In fact, of the 35 most critical elements in the world, China is the leader. producer of at least 20 This is where geopolitical technology and geology can sometimes overlap uncomfortably, whether it's China, the US, or someone else controlling most of an element that has a lot of influence concentrated in one place , which is why some researchers believe that the key to overcoming this form of criticality is to focus on finding more ways to do the same thing.

Another way might seem even more obvious. We could simply reuse the material we already have. Recycling important elements of discarded products would help resolve the three factors that produce criticality. Reusing the material would slow down the extraction. of a finite resource and reduce the need to continue mining, which could have a large environmental impact. One study found that recovering metals at a recycling plant produced 80 percent fewer emissions than extracting an equivalent amount, which is a win for stopping climate change and, unlike extraction, which can only happen where mineral deposits are found. Things can be recycled anywhere, which could reduce the market power of dominant producers.

The challenge is that recycling individual items is much more difficult than, say, recovering plastic from a milk jug. These materials often exist only in trace amounts. As part of a highly processed product like a circuit board, less than 1% of rare earth elements are recovered worldwide and in 2018 no arsenic was recycled anywhere in the world, but it ends up adding toxicity to your landfill. local. To reverse this trend, techniques as innovative as the materials themselves will be required. One idea is phytomining that uses specially selected plants to extract trace elements from recycled products. The plants concentrate the metal and their own structure, which can then be destroyed to recover the substance.

Another option is Bioleaching, which uses engineered bacteria to dissolve and extract metals such as copper and cobalt, is already used to produce more than 20% of the world's mental copper and researchers are investigating how to effectively use bioleaching and recycling programs, ultimately not We have many options when it comes to dealing with criticality, our modern forms of transportation, energy generation, and medicines have come to rely on these almost magical materials to maintain their benefits. We need to learn to deal with its scarcity, but it's not all bad news. Criticality is not a static problem, it is a Depending on our ability to design and discover, as we find new ways to solve problems and more accessible sustainable materials to use, we can circumvent some of these challenges, others will require learning to live within of the limitations of what is here on Earth, but that research is already underway.

Still, the next time you buy a fancy new phone, make sure you don't just throw away the old one - the items inside could literally be priceless. Thank you for watching this episode of scishow brought to you with the help of our sponsors. Sponsors earn great. Benefits and they also help us create amazing videos for everyone to enjoy. If you want to join, visit patreon.com/scishow.