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The coastal squeeze

June 26, 2025 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Globally, coastal areas are being squeezed between rising seas on one side and human development on the other. The average distance from the high waterline to the first built-up area with human structures or paved roads is less than 400 yards around the world. The narrower a coast, the sooner rising sea levels cause problems.

Narrow coasts have reduced ability to defend against storm surges and other weather events. Construction close to the sea makes coastal areas extra vulnerable. Narrow coasts are also bad news for biodiversity. A study by the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research investigated plant diversity in both the Netherlands and the United States. They found that the wider the coast was, the greater the plant diversity.

In Florida and Georgia, whenever coastal zones reached a couple of kilometers in width, diversity increased rapidly. In the Netherlands, only coastal areas at least 3.8 kilometers wide reached their maximum plant diversity, but such areas are rare. Dutch sand dune areas are typically no more than a kilometer wide, leaving plant diversity at no more than half the possible level.

Limited biodiversity in narrow coastal strips can be somewhat boosted by nature management but would benefit much more by spatial planning. In the Netherlands, a spot called The Sand Motor is where a gigantic amount of sand was deposited off the coast in 2011. Since then, natural forces have spread it along the coast. Such coastal expansion could increase biodiversity. Biodiversity is not a luxury. It makes for a better future for coastal defense, a healthy drinking water supply, and a better human food supply.

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Coastal squeeze is bad for biodiversity, and for us!

Photo, posted June 21, 2017, courtesy of Mark Bias via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

A better way to extract lithium

December 10, 2024 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Lithium is the critical component in the batteries that power phones and computers, electric cars, and the systems that store energy generated by solar and wind farms. Lithium is not particularly rare, but it is difficult and often environmentally harmful to extract from where it is found.

Traditional ore sources are increasingly difficult and expensive to mine. The largest known deposits of lithium are in natural brines – the salty water found in geothermal environments. These brines also contain other ions like sodium, potassium, magnesium, and calcium, and efficiently separating out the lithium is extremely challenging.

Traditional separation techniques consume large amounts of energy and produce chemical waste, particularly hazardous chlorine gas. These techniques typically suffer from poor selectivity; that is, the process is interfered with by the other ions present in natural brines.

A team of researchers at Rice University has developed a three-chamber electrochemical reactor that improves the selectivity and efficiency of lithium extraction from brines. The middle chamber of the reactor contains a specialized membrane that acts as a barrier to chloride ions, preventing them from getting to the electrode area where they can form chlorine gas.

The new reactor has achieved a lithium purity rate of 97.5%, which means the setup can effectively separate lithium from other ions in the brine and allow the production of high-quality lithium hydroxide, the key material for battery manufacturing.

The Rice University reactor design has the potential to be a game changer for lithium extraction from geothermal brines.

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‘Game changer’ in lithium extraction: Rice researchers develop novel electrochemical reactor

Photo, posted October 21, 2023, courtesy of Simaron via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

National drought

December 5, 2024 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Climate change brings with it many kinds of extreme weather. It isn’t just higher temperatures. It is changing patterns of weather and weather events that are rare or even unprecedented.

Late October saw drought conditions throughout almost the entire United States. Only Alaska and Kentucky did not have at least moderate drought conditions.

The previous four months were consistently warmer than normal over a large area of the country. When that period started, about a quarter of the country was at least somewhat dry, but in late October, 87% of the country was dry.

Droughts in many parts of the U.S. and in places around the world are becoming more frequent, longer in duration, and more severe.

Residents of New York City were urged to start conserving water. This October was the driest October since record keeping began in 1869. The upstate reservoirs that supply New York’s water were below two-thirds full. They are normally more than three-quarters full in the fall.

Even the Southeast, which received huge amounts of rain from Hurricane Helene, is experiencing drought. Not much rain had fallen since that storm and warmer temperatures mean more evaporation and drier soils.

Drought is not just a lack of precipitation. Drought conditions are driven by abnormally high temperatures that remove moisture from the atmosphere and the ground.

Whether widespread drought conditions will persist is unknown. If a predicted La Niña condition develops in the tropical Pacific, drought conditions in the southern half of the country could get worse, but the Northeast could see lots of rain and snow.

To have nearly the entire country experiencing drought conditions is pretty rare. But unusual weather is becoming the new normal.

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In a Record, All but Two U.S. States Are in Drought

Photo, posted May 21, 2024, courtesy of Adam Bartlett via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Mining extinct volcanoes

December 2, 2024 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Rare earth elements are a group of 17 elements that are used to improve the performance, efficiency, and durability of a wide range of products. More than 200 products across a diverse set of applications make use of rare earth elements. Although the amount of rare earth used in a particular product may not be very much of its weight, volume, or monetary value, it may often be necessary for the device even to function. Rare earth elements react with other elements to form compounds that are essential because of their specific chemical behaviors.

Rare earth elements are not actually rare; in fact, they are fairly common. But they are mostly not found in their pure form and are generally difficult to refine. China accounts for more than 90% of global production of rare earth elements and this represents a strategic problem for the rest of the world.

New research by scientists from the Australian National University has found that some extinct volcanoes, which have not erupted for thousands or even millions of years, may be rich sources of rare earth elements. Furthermore, those elements may be easier to extract than the ones from other sources because the iron-rich magma that formed the volcanoes could be up to 100 times more efficient at concentrating rare-earths than magma found in active volcanoes today.

The clean tech industry uses rare earths for wind turbines, solar panels, and electric cars. The demand for rare earths may grow fivefold by the end of this decade. Relying on just one country for the world’s supply is a major concern. There are ancient volcanoes all over the planet and they may represent a solution to a global problem.

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Extinct Volcanoes Could Be Source of Key Metals Needed for Clean Tech

Photo, posted June 6, 2020, courtesy of Dennis Jarvis via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Averting a mass extinction

July 19, 2024 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

There has been widespread concern that biodiversity is under siege and that we are in the beginnings of a sixth mass extinction in the long history of the Earth, this time caused by the actions of humanity. There has been considerable debate about what can be done about it and solutions generally involve protecting large areas of the planet from human disruptions. Some countries have set a target of protecting 30% of land and sea.

A new study by a broad coalition of conservation organizations and published in Frontiers in Science, concludes that humans can preserve much of the great diversity of life on Earth by setting aside just 1.2% of the planet for protection.

The experts mapped the wilderness available to rare and threatened plants and animals. They then identified specific hotspots for rare wildlife that have yet to be protected. They found a total of 16,825 such sites which nevertheless all together add up an area smaller than the state of Wisconsin.

Some scientists have been warning that by focusing too much on the size of protected lands, we are not necessarily safeguarding areas that are especially rich in wildlife. The new study pushes for prioritizing hotspots for rare species, which the authors claim would be sufficient to stave off a sixth mass extinction. The truth is that most species on Earth are rare, meaning that they are few in number or cover a small range, or both.

The study estimated that the cost of protecting the identified hotspot sites would be $263 billion, which is certainly a large amount of money. But the authors point out that this sum to save global biodiversity is less than the yearly revenue of Shell Oil.

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To Avert a Mass Extinction, Protect 1 Percent of Earth

Photo, posted April 20, 2018, courtesy of Per Harald Olsen / AfricanBioServices via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

The most endangered marine mammal

July 9, 2024 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

For the better part of a decade, conservationists have been trying to eliminate the use of gill nets by fishermen in the Gulf of California. Species such as the corvina fish have been decimated by the use of this fishing gear. The nets also trap other marine creatures, include the rare and elusive vaquita porpoise.

The vaquita is the world’s smallest porpoise, measuring no more than five feet in length. It is the most endangered marine mammal. They live only in the Gulf of California, which is the site of intense fishing activity. Some of that activity is directed towards a fish called the totoaba, which is an endangered species itself. The totoaba’s swim bladder is highly prized for Chinese traditional medicine, so there is a booming illegal market for it. The gill nets used to catch totoaba are especially lethal to vaquitas.

Every year, for a few weeks, an international team of scientists searches the Gulf for vaquitas. Recent surveys estimated that there are around 10 individuals in the area where they are most likely to be living. This year’s survey estimated that six to eight vaquitas are in the area. The ones spotted appeared to be in good health and one yearling was seen.

Officially, fishing with gill nets is banned throughout much of the upper Gulf of California. In practice, enforcement has been difficult to do. However, the Mexican government has been making an effort to improve the situation. The Mexican Navy dropped 193 concrete blocks with giant hooks designed to entangle gill nets to deter fishers and they plan to drop more.

The survival of the vaquita depends on whether the use of gill nets stops.

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The Most Endangered Marine Mammal Still Exists. Here’s the Latest Count.

Photo, posted July 12, 2011, courtesy of Semarnat via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Natural hydrogen

February 26, 2024 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Hydrogen is considered to be a potential substitute for conventional fossil fuels in applications where electricity cannot easily be used such as in blast furnaces, cement works, industrial heating, long-distance aviation, and shipping. But most hydrogen is manufactured by separating it from methane, which is energy-intensive and produces carbon dioxide. So-called green hydrogen is made by splitting water using electricity. It is a carbon-free process if the electricity is from renewable sources, but it is pretty expensive.

A small community in Mali gets its electricity by burning natural hydrogen, which bubbles up from underground into a village well. It has long been known that processes in the Earth’s crust can make hydrogen gas from water under certain circumstances. But conventional wisdom has been that this occurrence is rare and that the hydrogen produced is either inaccessible or seeps away.

An increasing number of geoscientists now are convinced that there is actually an enormous quantity of hydrogen beneath the planet’s surface and that we just haven’t been looking for it in the right places, or at all, for that matter. Some say that there could be trillions of tons of hydrogen, and more is being generated all the time.

Prospectors have recently been drilling for hydrogen in France, Australia, Morocco, Brazil, and in the United States, in Nebraska, Arizona, and Kansas. Will extracting natural hydrogen be practical at the scale required and will it be economical? The jury is still out on all of this, but if it turns out as proponents claim, natural hydrogen could be a very big deal.

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Natural Hydrogen: A Potential Clean Energy Source Beneath Our Feet

Photo, posted November 4, 2012, courtesy of Heather Paul via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Explosive Growth Of Electric Vehicles | Earth Wise

May 25, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Not long ago, electric cars were a rarity. Ten years ago, annual global sales of EVs were only a few hundred thousand. As of today, globally, still less than one percent of all the cars on the road are electric. But that is changing rapidly.

In fact, electric vehicles are expected to capture nearly 20% of the global market this year. Global sales of EVs were 3 million in 2020 and 6.6 million in 2021. Last year, sales of electric vehicles hit 10 million and are expected to reach 14 million this year according to the International Energy Agency.

Analysts at the IEA have had to repeatedly revise their projections for future EV sales as the numbers keep going up faster than predicted. Last year, they projected that EVs would account for 21% of global sales by 2030. Now, they expect that EVs will reach 35% of sales by that year.

In the US, the EU, and China, policy efforts are in place to boost EV sales. In the US, the Inflation Reduction Act both supports the EV industry and subsidizes consumer purchases with tax credits. As a result of such policies, the IEA expects electric vehicles to account for 60% of sales across these three large markets by 2030.

Part of what is driving the boom in EV sales is that prices continue to come down for the vehicles. When operating and maintenance costs are figured in, the EVs come out considerably cheaper to own. In addition, there are starting to be price wars in the EV industry as competition heats up in the sector.

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EVs to Capture One-Fifth of Global Market This Year Amid ‘Explosive Growth’

Photo, posted May 7, 2022, courtesy of Sharon Hahn Darlin via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Rare Earths And The Energy Transition | Earth Wise

May 19, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Limiting the rise in global temperature to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius requires decarbonization. This means slashing fossil fuel use, switching to renewable energy sources, and electrifying as many sectors of the economy as possible. Doing these things requires huge numbers of wind turbines, solar panels, electric vehicles, and storage batteries. All of them use rare earth elements and other critical metals.

The 17 rare earth elements are actually common, but they are called rare because they are seldom found in sufficient quantities to be extracted easily or economically.

China once supplied 97% of the world’s rare earth elements as a result of government support, cheap labor, lax environmental regulations, and low prices. Once the world started to realize the dangers of being so dependent on China, many countries began developing their own rare earth element production. (However, today China still produces 60-70% of the world’s rare earth elements).

It is difficult to mine rare earth elements without causing environmental damage. The prevalent extraction techniques involve toxic chemicals that can leach into the environment and, because rare earths are often found near radioactive elements, mining often brings dangerous radioactive waste into the environment.

Researchers are working on ways to make rare earth mining more sustainable. Some of these include biomining – which uses microbes to extract rare earths from ores, electrical methods to free rare earths from ores, and so-called agromining, which is growing plants that hyperaccumulate rare earths from the soil into their tissues.

Making rare earth mining more sustainable and less harmful to the environment is an essential part of the world’s future.

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The Energy Transition Will Need More Rare Earth Elements. Can We Secure Them Sustainably?

Photo, posted November 18, 2008, courtesy of the Oregon Department of Transportation via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Better Zinc Batteries | Earth Wise

May 17, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The rapid growth of wind and solar power continues to drive a global quest for new battery technologies that can be used to store the energy generated by these sources when the sun isn’t shining, and the wind isn’t blowing.

For the most part, current battery energy storage systems use lithium-ion batteries – the same sort of batteries found in cellphones and electric vehicles. There are many other battery chemistries, but they mostly have shortcomings in performance, economy, or longevity.

Batteries store electricity in the form of chemical energy and chemical reactions convert that energy into electrical energy. Every battery has two electrodes: the anode, from which electrons flow into external circuits, and the cathode, which receives electrons from the external circuit. The electrolyte is the chemical medium through which the electrons flow.

One technology that has great potential is zinc-based batteries. Zinc itself is a metal that is safe and abundant. Batteries based on it are energy dense. However, zinc batteries have faced the challenge of having a short cycle life. The batteries end up plating zinc on their anodes and battery performance degrades.

A team of researchers at Oregon State University and three other universities have recently developed a new electrolyte for zinc batteries that raises the efficiency of the zinc metal anode to nearly 100% – actually slightly better than lithium-ion batteries.

Zinc batteries have a number of potential advantages over lithium-ion. The new hybrid electrolyte developed by the researchers is non-flammable, cost-effective, and has low environmental impact. Lithium-ion batteries rely on the supplies of relatively rare metals that are often difficult and environmentally harmful to obtain.

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Researchers develop electrolyte enabling high efficiency of safe, sustainable zinc batteries

Photo, posted May 13, 2017, courtesy of Jeanne Menjoulet via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Triple La Niña | Earth Wise

January 16, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

La Niña is an oceanic phenomenon consisting of cooler than normal sea-surface temperatures in the central and eastern tropic Pacific. It is essentially the opposite of the better-known El Niño. These sea-surface phenomena affect weather across the globe. As one oceanographer put it: when the Pacific speaks, the whole world listens.

There is currently a La Niña underway, and it is the third consecutive northern hemisphere winter that has had one. This so-called triple-dip event is rather rare. The only other times they have been recorded over the past 70 years were in 1954-56, 1973-76, and 1998-2001.

La Niñas appear when strong easterly trade winds increase the upwelling of cooler water from the depths of the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean near the equator. This causes large-scale cooling of the ocean surface. The cooler ocean surface modifies the moisture content of the atmosphere across the Pacific and can cause shifts in the path of jet streams that intensifies rainfall in some places and causes droughts in others.

These weather effects tend to include floods in northern Australia, Indonesia, and southeast Asia and, in contrast, drought in the American southwest. In North America, cooler and stormier conditions often occur across the Pacific Northwest while the weather becomes warmer across the southern US and northern Mexico.

In the spring, the tropic Pacific essentially resets itself and starts building toward whatever condition will happen in the following winter, be it another La Niña or possibly an El Niño. For the time being, forecasters expect the current La Niña to persist through February.

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La Niña Times Three

Photo, posted March 10, 2007, courtesy of Gail via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Environmental DNA | Earth Wise

August 5, 2022 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Marine protected areas are sections of the ocean where governments place limits on human activity. They are intended to provide long-term protection to important marine and coastal ecosystems. MPAs are important because they can protect depleted, threatened, rare, and endangered species and populations.

In January 2020, the Republic of Palau in the western Pacific Ocean created one of the world’s largest marine protected areas. The Palau National Marine Sanctuary covers 80% of the country’s economic zone and prohibits all extractive activity like fishing and mining over a 183,000 square mile area in order for the island nation to ensure its food security and grow its economy in the face of climate change.

The Marine Sanctuary is an ambitious enterprise. The question is how Palau can evaluate whether and how well it is working?

A team of scientists from Stanford University and Palau-based colleagues are making use of Environmental DNA – or eDNA – technology to monitor the large-scale marine protected area. eDNA is the cells, waste, viruses, and microorganisms that plants and animals leave behind. Samples of marine eDNA effectively provide a fingerprint of the organisms that have recently passed through the water in a given area. This gives scientists a way to assess an ecosystem’s biodiversity and keep track of the types of species inhabiting a specific area. Using eDNA, it is possible to keep track of all the organisms that live below the surface and learn about things we can’t even see.

The team has embarked on a program of periodic sampling of the waters off Palau and hope to be able to monitor the results of establishing the Marine Sanctuary.

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eDNA: Bringing biodiversity to the surface

Photo, posted June 12, 2013, courtesy of Gregory Smith via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Tree Diversity | Earth Wise

March 4, 2022 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Scientists have estimated that there are more than 8 million species of plants and animals in existence. Amazingly, only about 1.2 million of them have been identified and described so far and most of those are actually insects. Millions of other organisms have yet to be discovered.

One would imagine that most of these unknown species are tiny things that are hard to spot or encounter. But our ignorance of species even applies to trees, which are pretty easy to spot if you encounter them.

A new study involving more than 100 scientists across the globe has produced an estimate of the number of tree species on the Earth. The new global estimate is that there are 73,000 tree species, which is about 14% more than previously thought. Based on a combination of data from two global datasets, the study yielded a total of 64,100 documented tree species worldwide. The researchers then used novel statistical methods to estimate the total number of unique tree species at biome, continental, and global scales, which includes species yet to be discovered and described by scientists. Therefore, the estimate predicts that there are likely to be over 9,000 tree species still to be found.

Roughly 40% of the undiscovered tree species are likely to be in South America, which is the continent with the highest number of rare tree species and the highest number of continentally endemic tree species – meaning those found only on that continent. Hot spots of undiscovered tree species are likely the tropical and subtropical moist forests of the Amazon basin and the Andes-Amazon interface.

Extensive knowledge of tree richness and diversity is key to preserving the stability and functioning of ecosystems.

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Number of Earth’s tree species estimated to be 14% higher than currently known, with some 9,200 species yet to be discovered

Photo, posted November 5, 2017, courtesy of Deensel via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Florida’s Starving Manatees | Earth Wise

January 12, 2022 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Manatees, also called “sea cows”, have been the victims of farm runoff. They have starved to death by the hundreds along Florida’s east coast because algae blooms fed by nitrogen-rich fertilizer runoff are proliferating on the ocean surface and blocking sunlight from reaching seagrass below. Seagrass is the primary source of food for manatees in the winter. As seagrass dies off, so do the manatees.

Over 1,000 manatees have been found dead so far this year. It is estimated that fewer than 8,000 remain in Florida waters. Efforts are underway to restore coastal seagrass in the region as well as clams and oysters, which filter pollutants from water. Unless the water is cleared up, it will be difficult to regrow the seagrass. But the current situation is that manatees are so short on food that they are eating seagrass roots, killing the plants and thwarting efforts to help seagrass recovery.

Given this dire situation, the federal governmental has approved a program of feeding manatees. The starving animals will be fed by hand in Florida, which is a rare wildlife intervention. Conservation agencies tend to favor leaving wild animals to their own foraging and hunting so that they don’t become dependent on human handouts.

During the trial phase of the program, wildlife experts are likely to feed the animals romaine lettuce and cabbage, which is what manatees in captivity eat. The hope is to give the animals enough additional food for them to get through the winter. The trial feeding will begin on private property. It remains illegal for the public to feed manatees.

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Florida to feed starving manatees in rare conservation move

Photo, posted February 21, 2008, courtesy of Keith Ramos/USFWS via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Safer Ways To Be Blue | Earth Wise

May 5, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Creating blue fabric has always been desirable for people. It has never been easy, but the original way to do it – by using indigo from plants – has been around for 6,000 years. Natural indigo is a rare commodity, often referred to as blue gold. In the 19th century, synthetic indigo was developed and ultimately replaced the natural substance.

Synthetic indigo dye is not an environmentally friendly substance. In order to get it to adhere to fabrics, substances called mordants are required. These are commonly made from metals like chromium and aluminum, are generally toxic, and kill off plants exposed to factory wastewater, destroy ecosystems, and poison drinking water. The dye itself is slow to decompose and is bad for the environment.

Recently, an organic chemist in Brazil named Erick Bastos has figured out a new way to produce blue dye using, of all things, a pigment from beets. By extracting the pigment and tweaking its molecular pattern, he has managed to transform the red color of the pigment to a brilliant blue.

Beet roots contain pigments called betalains and just a tiny amount of beetroot juice can render a lot of dye. By mixing these pigments with a couple of ingredients, a chemical reaction occurred, and the color transformed from red, to yellow, then green, and finally blue.

Testing so far on human liver cells, retinal cells, and developing zebrafish has revealed no toxicity. The results suggest that the new dye – dubbed BeetBlue – is safe. Further testing is needed to know if it is truly safe and whether it will last in the wash. Meanwhile, Professor Bastos is not patenting the dye and hopes it will provide a better way to be blue.

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How Do You Make a Less Toxic Blue Dye? Start With Red Beets

Photo, posted November 7, 2005, courtesy of Lain Buchanan via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Rare Earths From Mining Waste

May 3, 2019 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The 17 rare earth elements have become important parts of much of modern technology. Despite their name, most of these elements are relatively plentiful in the earth’s crust, but because of their geochemical properties they are typically dispersed and not often found concentrated in minerals. As a result, economically exploitable ore deposits are uncommon. There are no significant sources in the U.S.

Rare earths play important roles in high-performance magnets, electric motors in vehicles, wind turbines, microphones and speakers, and in portable electronics like cell phones. As these applications become ever larger, the need for additional sources of rare earths increases.

Researchers at Idaho National Laboratory and Rutgers University have studied a method for extracting rare-earth elements from mining waste that could greatly increase the world’s supply of these valuable materials.

It turns out that large amounts of rare earths exist in phosphogypsum, a waste product from producing phosphoric acid from phosphate rock. The U.S. alone mined 28 million tons of phosphate rock in 2017. (Phosphoric acid is used in the production of fertilizers and other products).

The researchers estimate that more than a billion tons of phosphogypsum waste sits in piles at storage sites across the U.S. alone. World-wide, about 100,000 tons of rare earth elements per year end up in phosphogypsum waste. This compares to the total current world-wide production of rare earth oxides of 126,000 tons.

The researchers studied methods for extracting the elements from the waste. A method utilizing a common environmental bacterium showed great promise.

There are concerns about residual radioactivity and other environmental issues in dealing with the waste material, but the world’s supply of rare earth elements might become much greater based on this research.

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