Japan Begins Recycling Rare Earth Metals From Electronics 168
Black Gold Alchemist writes "Dowa, a Japanese mining company in Kosaka, has begun the recycling of rare earth metals from used cellphones and computers. This is in response to a recent, temporary trade embargo from China, which is the leading supplier of rare earth metals needed for production of products including hybrid cars, wind turbines, and LCD screens. Because of the shortage of rare earth metals, Japanese trade minister Akihiro Ohata is asking the government to include a rare earth strategy in its supplementary budget for this year."
about time too... (Score:5, Insightful)
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The future is going to be like Against a Dark Background, we'll be going through the piles of debris looking for exotic metals.
That or we go to the asteroids and mine them.
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That's a novel. I had no idea what it was (thought maybe movie, book, video game).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_a_dark_background [wikipedia.org]
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Maybe I've been mislead, but when I drop a busted motherboard (or other e-device with capacitors) off at my local e-waste recycling depot, isn't it being shipped to China (etc) for this recycling to happen?
Or were the rare earths in the capacitors considered to be of no value given market conditions?
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I wonder if goo.gl being associated with goatse and other shock images will have sort of a "google bombing" effect. Maybe it'll push them to add a preview feature like every other URL shortening service.
Goes to show how much of recycling is a gimmick (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, this goes to show how much of electronics recycling is a gimmick and publicity stunt.
Separating rare earths out of electronics waste is actually not that difficult: hit it with acid; do some basic purification first to get rid of Fe, Cu and a few other "usual suspects"; after that ion exchange chromatography does the deed. Even without initial mechanical separation there should be enough of them in the acid effluent. The fact that it was not done shows how much are we really "recycling" there.
In fact, we should say thank you to China on this one. This may finally make EU, USA and Japan governments put some money behind the electronic waste disposal laws.
Not Sure, Seems to Be More Territorial Dispute (Score:3, Insightful)
In fact, we should say thank you to China on this one.
Recent news reports have Japan accusing China of this being over a territorial dispute [washingtonexaminer.com]. The traders are saying that things have resumed [businessweek.com] but that this is just an excuse for China to harass traders and outbound exports with "preshipment" checks [reuters.com]. China denies this has anything to do with the dispute but the timing is more than a bit suspect and why is this only directed at Japan?
I don't know how much of an net positive environmental impact recycling rare earths from circuitry provides (is your acid econ
Re:Not Sure, Seems to Be More Territorial Dispute (Score:5, Informative)
In fact, we should say thank you to China on this one.
Recent news reports have Japan accusing China of this being over a territorial dispute [washingtonexaminer.com]. The traders are saying that things have resumed [businessweek.com] but that this is just an excuse for China to harass traders and outbound exports with "preshipment" checks [reuters.com]. China denies this has anything to do with the dispute but the timing is more than a bit suspect and why is this only directed at Japan?
China is in territorial dispute with every SE-Asian country that has a shoreline. They claim sovereignty over every island down to the Philippines. For example, they have claims over Paracel islands which in theory, belong to Vietnam. Recently they started to harass fishing boats, hold them at ransom, very similar to what Somalian pirates do. Vietnam has historical documents to prove their claim - irony is, that actually some of the documents the Chinese produced to prove their point turned out to be validate the Vietnamese claims (they mention these islands as "foreign lands" in their records). Also, they threatened foreign companies (oil exploration) that had contracts with Vietnamese oil companies to back out. Finally - this started this year - they began to organize "tours" to these islands, showing the beauty of these "most remote Chinese lands." In reality, there's nothing to see there actually. Except Vietnamese fishermen who lived there for generations. Well, not anymore, actually, but you get the point ... just trying to illustrate how territorial the Chinese are... and how arrogant.
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Paracel islands which in theory, belong to Vietnam
In theory, they belong to the Earth. Everyone is arrogant in claiming land. What you said about China is the same as what Japan has been doing to China, and what Russia has been doing to Japan. But this time China found a way to challenge Japan because Japan positioned itself as "there is no territorial disputes between the countries".
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I don't know how much of an net positive environmental impact recycling rare earths from circuitry provides
As I recall, separating ore into rare earths isn't a clean process either, so it may still come out ahead.
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I don't per se know much about this particular situation, but I do know enough about generic Chinese history to make a general statement that China pretty much claims all of East Asia. At one point or another in its long (and often, but not always, glorious) history China has managed to conquer just about every piece of the East Asian continent; and has a habit of considering anything it once owned to belong to it forever.
So again, I'm not going to comment one way or the other on this specific situation an
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but as a general rule of thumb any country claiming sovereignty over any piece of the world (up to and including their own countries in some cases) risks attracting the nose of the USA.
FTFY
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What the GP said is quite insightful to those who are aware of everyone's bias. FTFY
FTFY
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The GP's post is hardly insightful and by assuming so you reveal your own bias and ignorance. Those islands were controlled by Japan after the first Sino-Japanese war in 1895, 4 decades prior to the start of conflicts that led to WWII. The Chinese government of that era even officially recognized them as being administered by the Japanese government, they had never officially claimed them. The GP's point was that all land Japan gained during WWII should be returned to their owners, however as I've state
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Fearing a loss of Taiwan to mainland China, the US government would also not want to hand them over to Taiwan, hence the passage of the islands to the Japanese.
If they belonged to Japan all along, why would the US consider returning them to Taiwan?
Any other reason is a bold faced lie.
Did the CIA pay you to post that?
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I don't believe that was ever officially considered an option by the US Government. However many Chinese nationalists believe it should have been given to Taiwan.
No. You can go through my thousands of posts on slashdot if you want proof that I'm not a CIA shill or any shill for that matter, unlike the other anonymous poster.
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I don't believe that was ever officially considered an option by the US Government.
But your previous statement implied that. Since you are not ignorant, you should know the US position at that time. Or do you just speak without knowing the facts?
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The GP's post referred to handing over the islands to Taiwan, I simply addressed it.
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I take that back, I'm assuming he's the same anonymous coward who has been making other posts in this thread in which he did mention that.
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If you're curious as to the official stance of the US government during this time period, here it is from the Starr Memorandum.
Re:Goes to show how much of recycling is a gimmick (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, this goes to show how much of electronics recycling is a gimmick and publicity stunt.
Actually, it shows that current electronics recycling is not a gimmick, at least in Japan. The entire infrastructure apparently is already in place, is functioning, and is economical enough to survive. There is more to recycling than just rare metals.
Re:Goes to show how much of recycling is a gimmick (Score:5, Interesting)
it shows that current electronics recycling is not a gimmick, at least in Japan.
Not terribly sure about electronics, but with everything else you'd probably be amazed. I have 7 different garbage categories in my town. I have to put my name and location on my garbage bags. If I make a mistake in sorting the garbage, they send it back to me (it has happened more than once...). And it's not just gross sorting. With pet bottles I have to take the caps off (different category) and the labels off (different category). My yogurt containers are made from recyclable plastic covered with cardboard. I have to separate the cardboard from the plastic and put it in different containers. Etc, etc, etc...
Electronics is easy. You take it to the electronics shop and they take care of it for you. I'm not sure exactly what they do, but I'm assuming it's fairly rigorous. Japan just doesn't have any landfill space...
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it shows that current electronics recycling is not a gimmick, at least in Japan.
Not terribly sure about electronics, but with everything else you'd probably be amazed. I have 7 different garbage categories in my town. I have to put my name and location on my garbage bags. If I make a mistake in sorting the garbage, they send it back to me (it has happened more than once...). And it's not just gross sorting. With pet bottles I have to take the caps off (different category) and the labels off (different category). My yogurt containers are made from recyclable plastic covered with cardboard. I have to separate the cardboard from the plastic and put it in different containers. Etc, etc, etc...
Electronics is easy. You take it to the electronics shop and they take care of it for you. I'm not sure exactly what they do, but I'm assuming it's fairly rigorous. Japan just doesn't have any landfill space...
Where in Japan are you? Just curious.
But other than that, you are on point. I was in Yokohama during new years eve, and it is amazing the discipline involved in the proper recycling of garbage (discipline displayed by both the collectors and the general population.) I believe it is not only out of modern necessity, but that Japan has historically been a clean country, much more than any other country as testified by Eastern and Western travelers back in the day.
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I think it's that Japanese have always been meticulous in everything they do. They're also very good about following rules. In many countries, particularly the US, even people who believe in recycling would likely be pissed a the prospect of having to sort their garbage so extensively.
And I can't help but wonder, why is the recycling company not doing this? Aren't these people paying taxes so that their garbage is processed properly?
recycling is un-American (Score:2)
I think it's that Japanese have always been meticulous in everything they do. They're also very good about following rules. In many countries, particularly the US, even people who believe in recycling would likely be pissed a the prospect of having to sort their garbage so extensively.
And I can't help but wonder, why is the recycling company not doing this? Aren't these people paying taxes so that their garbage is processed properly?
We in the US have a cultural problem where people get pissed off at anything that involves them moving a finger outside of their 9-5 work schedule.
I hear ya. What you are describing is one of the many symptoms of a malady affecting the US. There is this parochial, not-in-my-backyard backward mentality where the government/something/somebody must solve all their problems so long as it does not involve them physically or financially (.ie. taxes.)
Minimal government that can solve everything, including tu
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Electronics is easy. You take it to the electronics shop and they take care of it for you. I'm not sure exactly what they do, but I'm assuming it's fairly rigorous. Japan just doesn't have any landfill space...
Often, it is sent to China http://www.engadget.com/2008/11/10/video-chinas-toxic-wastelands-of-consumer-electronics-revealed/ [engadget.com] . It is supposed to be illegal now, and presumably regulations are being enforced http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basel_Convention [wikipedia.org]
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Yup, I just took my "combustible" garbage out and there was no shortage of PET bottles mixed in with it, even though there is a separate collection day for those.
(As far as PET bottles go, Germany has a very simple solution: a mandatory 50 Euro-cent deposit on each bottle, and suddenly they become worth something, and there will always be someone willing to go round and pick up any dropped / lost ones).
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That's funny, because I live in Shizuoka. Actually, it all depends on the city/town. My town is very strict. But my friend in the next town over can mix his burnable and non-recyclable plastic. I'm absolutely amazed that there's anyplace here that accepts pet bottles in burnable trash, though.
Re:Goes to show how much of recycling is a gimmick (Score:4, Interesting)
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Uh... if China closed its ports tomorrow, who would blink first: them, or the rest of the world?
Up to now, China has been a most benign economic superpower, certainly far less abusive than Russia, the EU or the USA who engage in round-robin economic blackmail pretty much constantly.
If China ever start punching at their actual weight - for example, asking what exactly they can buy with the trillions of foreign currency that they're sitting on - then we'll all be they beeyatches.
Re:Goes to show how much of recycling is a gimmick (Score:5, Interesting)
If China tried that, it wouldn't actually happen and would show the lack of power their central government actually wages. It would probably lead to the overthrow of the Chinese government long before it brought down any foreign power.
China's entire currency system is economic blackmail. By all rights it should have appreciated an extra 50%, and the rest of the world is increasingly unwilling to succumb to such blackmail.
They can't "buy" anything with it. They have to hold on to it in order to artificially affect the exchange rates of the currencies. Their dependence on US debt purchases for this means WE have THEM over a barrel. Relatively minor policy changes on our part could have sweeping effects on the valuation of their entire economic system. Of course, they have nowhere else to dump the money so they continue to rely on US debt purchases despite its weakness. Imagine if 90% of your 401K was also kept in your company's stock... think Enron's employees... that's what China is potentially setting itself up for by buying so much debt from their biggest trading partner and the largest economy in the world.
Fiscal MAD? (Score:2)
great.. you know how well that worked with the housing market-- right?
A buttload of debt, and this system work so long as the borrowing continues-
it'll keep working right? we just increase the value of our home(country) and
refinance and buy a motorcycle or boat?
what is that you say? real estate crash? when did that happen?
what is this term? underwater? what does that mean?
how does it feel to know that the US is propped up by it's debt structure.
that if we were fiscally responsible, well- we'd be proppe
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If the debt fueled currency manipulation system collapses tomorrow. China is far better off that the US - it would suck for both of them.
What is the difference to China in any of the following:
* Ship goods to the US in exchange for dollars which are converted to. The government then prints some local currency and buys treasuries with it to keep the exchange rate where they want it.
* The government prints some local currency and exchanges that directly fore the goods, which are then dumped in the ocean.
* Th
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Oh, right, that's why every single country buys US debt. Literally every country on Earth is a sucker. It doesn't matter that we have the world's biggest economy, the most manufacturing, most R&D, the biggest, most advanced military, the largest entertainment sector, the fact that the US has a lower debt-to-GDP ratio than half the world (including many European countries), and the de facto language of worldwide trade is English.
None of that matters. The US debt is garbage, despite the US Treasury Bonds
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US debt is popular because international trade is done in US dollars and you might as well earn some interest on the holdings you have to have in order to play that game. And a US treasury is exactly equivalent to a US dollar since the US would print money to pay off those debts before they defaulted - hence no additional risk.
Yes US treasuries are considered the safest debt in the world, but these things move slowly and the world hasn't woken up to the fact that the US can't possibly pay back all that deb
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You have a point, but consider - the UK and the USSR were both at the height of their power while the US existed (the USSR didn't even exist before the US, while the UK was at the height of its power in the early 1920's) , and they both fell out of that position while the US existed, both largely because of the influences of the US. They also both still exist in incarnations that are internationally strong.
You also assume that the Chinese government doesn't collapse before the relatively small weight of the
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So the China is like a man handcuffed to a potential suicide on top of a skyscraper (the US), and if the potential suicide decides to jump they go with them? I'm not sure you should assume that the potential suicide is in the better position.
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Put another way... If you can't pay the bank back on a 200k mortgage you have a problem. If you can't pay the bank back on a trillion dollar loan the bank has a problem. In this case.. China is the bank.
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It wouldn't have those billions if it hadn't be manipulating it's currency for over a decade ... you are confusing biding their time with being benign. They can not just jank US and EU consumption and go completely domestic ... everything would instantly go to shit. They are not self sufficient in food or raw materials either.
They will just wait for the US and the EU to slowly choke their consumption through austerity while they build up their internal consumption and start profiting from both all the facto
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They want to increase percentage of GDP from domestic consumption by 7% over 5 years ... that's a huge amount, they can afford some softening in US demand. As for starting to run trade deficits of their own with mercantist neighbours using China's old tricks and losing their industrial base ... I don't think they will allow it.
China's government might be totalitarian ... but I don't think it will fuck over it's population the same way first world super rich got their governments to fuck over it's population
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"it's" -> "its" ... blah.
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What world do you live in? Those 3 scenarios are tantamount to declarations of war...
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1) Deliberately causing the destruction of billions of dollars worth of US military and civilian equipment is not going to get the Americans pissed off?
2) The Korean War is still going on, and it's not like China won it.
3) Good luck, if they were to do such a thing, business would pull out of China and international trade with their largest trading partners would collapse to a standstill. I don't think you thought your cunning plan all the way through.
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I don't think you understand what he was saying. For all the R&D the U.S. does, it still needs factories with the blueprints, plans, etc. and those are in China. If they nationalize factories, they are holding all of the IP. If they stop exporting, the U.S. would immediat
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While I enjoy the occasional US bashing, this is completely wrong.
If you just look at the structure of China's manufacturing, you'll see why. Their value added is still almost 100% coming from cheap labor. For every $100 of exports, China imports about $95, and adds about $5. Almost anything high-tech is still not manufactured there, just assembled. As for the "IP" ... they hold the schematics, true, but without the US, Japanese and Korean chips to fit in those PCB boards, what good does it do to them?
This
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No other Asian country spoke a word in favor of Japan
But I don't think any Asian country has spoken a word in favour of China over this issue either.
I think most of us in Asia don't care very much - not like they'd be crazy to start a war over a few little islands. Yes it does affect the territory (and might have oil and gas), no it's still NOT important enough (don't be stupid just share the oil and gas 50:50 instead of warring). So my opinion regarding this dispute is, whoever starts shooting people first is the bad guy.
It's just like trademark enforcement.
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I think most Asian countries are playing the three-monkey card because they are trying to get their economies moving due to this recession, and they just do not want to see military conflict happen. No country in the Pacific Rim wants to see a replay of "The Guns of August" in their neck of the woods.
If Asia destabilized, it would make the Middle East chaos look like a mere bar-fight.
Re:Goes to show how much of recycling is a gimmick (Score:5, Informative)
Separating rare earths out of electronics waste is actually not that difficult: hit it with acid; do some basic purification first to get rid of Fe, Cu and a few other "usual suspects"; after that ion exchange chromatography does the deed.
Separating them from other stuff is easy, usually because these elements are very reactive. Separating them from each other is another, much harder task [acs.org]. Actually, using ion exchange chromatography I doubt you can get tonnes of chemically pure metal. You need a lot of fancy chemistry. Actually this is the most polluting part [rfa.org] of the industrial process and one of the contributing factors to closing US and European refining plants.
Re:Goes to show how much of recycling is a gimmick (Score:4, Interesting)
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Basel Action Network [ban.org]
It's unfortunate that the developed world has put pure profit over ethics in disposal of their waste, but keep in mind that in most cases Africa and China are not simply the cheapest place, they are actually paying to have this waste dumped on their shores. China in particular has laws in place to stop the practice that they chose not to enforce because the value of the commodities is great and the cost of labor and health concerns
Coal power station ash dams (Score:2)
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"Mercury is not caught very well by precipitators."
Uh, duh, because you want to CHELATE it, not precipitate it.
Sounds like you may want to brush up on your basic chemistry.
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Really, there are all sorts of things that can bind mercury.
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Also notice how all of those "facts" come out of Oak ridge and can be traced back to a rant in a NEWSLETTER from the 1970s. Meanwhile peer reviewed coal geologists can't find the stuff and nobody is seeing it come out of the stacks despite the technology to find it being around since at least 1880.
Forget precipitators, it's the scrubbers that get the mercury along with the far more difficult t
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Clearly, if you can break it down to aone sentences it's not hard.
Shheeesh. It is hard.
Re:Goes to show how much of recycling is a gimmick (Score:4, Insightful)
the only competitive advantage is the ability to refine the ore economically with low environmental impact.
Or the ability to refine it economically without giving a fuck about the environmental impact.
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Or the ability to refine it economically without giving a fuck about the environmental impact.
Japan doesn't have much land to just dump toxins in. So you're talking about exporting the problem to a 3rd world country. Which is I guess not much different from what's going on now.
Not exactly a first (Score:4, Insightful)
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The tech described there is metallurgy. It is good for recovering Fe, Cu and Pb (which is nowdays banned anyway). I have some doubts about its ability to recover rare earths effectively.
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I wonder if we will see landfill mining in our lifetimes? It seems like we'd need a pretty astounding shortage of Cu and Fe before it would be energy efficient to start digging through the landfills for old TVs and washing machines
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Landfill mining is sort of already happening. Copper "dealers" buy or "liberate" certain parts from cars in junkyards for the copper. Try finding the main battery leads for any BMW with a rear-mounted battery. A junkyard may price these 15' long thick copper cables the same as the 6"-3' long battery leads (which are often made of steel instead of copper) on most cars.
Also try finding copper piping in any abandoned house in a bad neighborhood.
I've heard that transmission casings are one of the most highly pr
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Try finding your AC heat exchanger coils anywhere in New Orleans. Those suckers just vanish these days.
other options are also being considered (Score:5, Interesting)
like, for example, importing the stuff from mongolia. this may turn out to be the faster and cheaper way out.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704380504575529383600995748.html [wsj.com]
The most interesting part of this mini-debacle is how did the idea that there would be a shortage of rare earth elements came about at all, and why did the Chinese believe it, the idea being utter bullshit.
While it is true that China manages to produce these cheaply at the moment, rare earth elements are available basically all over the place in similar proportions.
Using them as a policy-making tool has done no harm to Japan, and potentially a lot of harm to the credibility of China as an economic player, especially to its counterparties in Asia, but also anyone who may have a reason to expect potential future clash of interests.
While the Japanese acted out during the crisis as scared pussies, the Chinese appear to have played the role of the dumber party.
Seeing great Asian powers like Japan and China just learning to dab at foreign relations after 6 decades of American dominance is very interesting.
Re:other options are also being considered (Score:5, Interesting)
While it is true that China manages to produce these cheaply at the moment, rare earth elements are available basically all over the place in similar proportions.
Correction, China produces zinc cheaply at the moment. Mostly due to complete lack of environmental regulation.
The situation with indium is weird. If you scooped up a random perfectly mixed shovel full of global average earth crust, its 3x as high concentration as silver, which sounds GREAT. However, unlike silver, it never really accumulates anywhere. The current best source is some of the residue of zinc ore production, where its a spectacular 50 ppm, about 200x more concentrated than average crust composition. Silver sometimes is dug out of the ground in nuggets of more or less pure silver, which is a factor of a million more concentrated than average, plus or minus an order of magnitude. Thats why we have mines for silver, but no mines for indium.
So indium is freaking everywhere, all over, at a very low level. Last I heard, it wanders around a tenth of gold price. You could get about ten oz of indium per thousand tons of "average crust"... At roughly current indium prices thats about a thousand bucks revenue for processing about a thousand tons of dirt. A buck a ton isn't going to do it, even with slave labor in China. But what if the price went up to, say, platinum prices? Thats $20K revenue for a thousand tons of dirt, or $20 per ton. I'm thinking $20/ton is economically viable, maybe even in the USA...
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Yes, but when your current supply lines are focused on one place, changing them is expensive and time consuming.
It's not like Japan has a lot of land they can mine on.
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Re:other options are also being considered (Score:5, Informative)
Are you going say US restrictions on crypto/hi-tech export is doing "a lot of harm to the credibility of the US as an economic player"?
It most certainly did. Did you miss the few years in the 90s when it spurred a large body of crypto research and work outside of the US by all parties, who were affected by the ban?
Are you going to say Russia's restricting food export due to projected shortage, or Thailand's restriction of rice export due to poor harvest is doing "a lot of harm to the credibility of these 2 countries as an economic player
Having a reason for the restriction (shortage due to a crop failure) is something quite different from using trade limits as a policy tool. I am not sure why you can't see the difference.
For example, the attempts of Putin to use gas exports as a policy tool in Europe has certainly brought more than a few frowns from the EU. With Ukraine, it exploded into a full-blown trade war.
is just a simple message to Japan saying "we are not going to let you slap us in our face and then expect business to go on smoothly".
It is my understanding that the arrested captain tried to ram a Japanese vessel. This is certainly a crime in Japan, and probably one in China. In this case, it seems China is applying laws more selectively than Japan.
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It is my understanding that the arrested captain tried to ram a Japanese vessel. This is certainly a crime in Japan, and probably one in China. In this case, it seems China is applying laws more selectively than Japan.
One thing to note is that there is a video of the event but it hasn't been seen by anyone other than the investigating parties. The Diet has asked to see it and there is a debate over whether or not to let the government see the video. Apparently there is some worries that making the video public (even to just the government) could incite China further. However, part of me wonders if that's the whole story. After all this fuss, I'd certainly like to see it...
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Me too. I've heard that the Japanese are hiding it in order to defuse the situation, but I'd rather judge for myself.
Still, I can see how it can inflame China further even if it shows that the Japanese vessel is not at fault.
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The Japanese don't allow anyone to enter territory waters of the islands, even though they only have administrative rights, meaning they can't arrest anyone simple for entering the waters. So they create crimes by positioning a boat in front of any vessel that is navigating towards the island.
Recently the Chinese fishery authority sent two boats to circle the island and played this cat'n mouse game with 6 Japanese boats. From the articles I read, it was very funny.
Since the Japanese only have administrati
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Your understanding is wrong, here's a video for you with the ships in question. They are of similar size :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVJC-eV8jRA [youtube.com]
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So the troll post you replied to is wrong, but it isn't clear just what happened.
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See what I mean?
Yes I am being paid however, since I am at work at this hour.
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Both countries have had their governments and government bureaucracies ripped apart and rebuilt basically from scratch post-WWII.
In China, the communists removed KMT, sent Chiang to Taiwan and started from zero. Three times, actually, if you count the Cultural revolution, and the subsequent removal of the Maoist wing by Deng.
Some countries refused to acknowledge the existence of PRC until the 70s, and China started to really perceive itself and try to act as a superpower very recently.
In post-war Japan, the
Non-cycle? (Score:5, Insightful)
What this suggests is that there should be a middle ground between dumping stuff in a landfill and recycling it. We should be segregating material that we don't currently recycle or doesn't make economic sense to recycle, but might become scarce in the future. That will make it easier to recycle when we need it.
Re:Non-cycle? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Non-cycle? (Score:5, Insightful)
In Norway we have plastic, glass, metal, electronic, paper and food scrap recycling and it's pretty popular. I think most everyone just does it because it's the 'right thing' to do. It doesn't hurt that there's curbside for most of it.
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Here (California) it varies widely depending on where you are. In the town where I live, we have one container for metals, plastics, and glass, and one for paper (used to have separate containers for metals, glass, plastic, and paper, but they consolidated). Green waste gets picked up separately (no container, you just pile it on the side of the street and it gets picked up once a week), and e-waste you have to cart out to the landfill (it doesn't go into the landfill, you just take it there to drop it off
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Here in Texas, we have single stream recycling, where everything recyclable gets put into one bin, then gets separated out at the plant. Austin, Dallas, and Houston all have this, and for two out of the three cities, it actually turns a profit. The third city signed a really poor contract with three times the processing fees as the other two cities, otherwise it would actually be receiving a check from the recycler as well.
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Do you meant ehya re actually recycled? or do you mean they are put in a box for recycling and then taken away?
As recycling gets more and more 'wider', the cost of centralizing the separation becomes better then doing it at the curb.
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Based on the amount we pay for trash pickup, the 40% tax rate, Norwegian's compulsive honesty I'm pretty sure it's being dealt with appropriately. Every large kommune also has a bio-gas plant where a good deal of the gas-able materials go. As for the E-Waste, I don't rightly know. In the USA, a good deal of the E-Waste is just dumped in third world countries.
But again, based on the typical Norwegian compulsive and inescapable honesty, they probably recycle the computer bits using a method that is five ti
Other than food? (Score:2)
what- you have something against compost?
Re:Non-cycle? (Score:4, Informative)
It's really not that difficult. A waste-energy plant I have as a client already separates out glass, copper, brass, zinc, ferrous metal, and aluminum, and this is an old plant, built in the late 1980s that was really only designed to produce power plant fuel. The material separation is more about protecting the furnaces at the generating plant with a refined fuel product than recycling. I think most of the metal separation is targeted at cash value.
The problem (Score:3, Interesting)
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Eventually, if prices on these materials goes up enough, we may end up mining landfills for them.
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Coincidentally, much of it ends up in China [time.com], poisoning the local population.
Similar dumps can be found all over Africa and Asia.
Necessity... (Score:5, Insightful)
Sadly this is the way we overcome our big problems. Not by foresight, predictions and educated action. The shit has to start hitting the fan to get people moving in the right direction. I mean this whole rare earth situation has been foreseen. It was obvious that China was building a monopoly years ago. The same thing happens with the coming helium shortage, energy problems, global warming, you name it. It really has to get nasty for people to do something about these things.
Misnomer (Score:2)
Find the shiney! (Score:2)
Isn't that how it works?
http://www.comedycentral.com/videos/index.jhtml?title=e-waste-delivery&videoId=314027 [comedycentral.com]
Good luck (Score:2, Funny)
Let's see how they will do with rare Mars metals :)
reuse better than "recycling" (Score:4, Insightful)
As with everything else, reuse is most always better than recycling.
Royalty-free standards should be created for battery shapes and connectors, and a garbage tax should be placed on non-standard batteries.
Interchangeable parts were key to the industrial revolution. Sometimes we forget.
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True enough
Huh? What would this accomplish? By the time the battery is tossed, it doesn't work. So reusing it won't be of much help unless you have a particularly twisted sense of humor. Most batteries can't simply be just put back into production - remember batteries are just enclosed chemical react
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We are already there. Take laptop batteries or batteries for phones. There are so many different types of batteries. It would be nice to have a standard across all of them, but device makers rather engineer (or have the fellas over in China do the designing) the battery around the object than making something around standard size cells.
Of course we do have battery waste from these because in a year or so, the warranty on laptop batteries expire and shortly after, the batteries themselves do. Perhaps the
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The casings are different but the cells inside are all standardized.
Laptop batteries are made of multiple cylindrical lithium ion cells just a bit larger than AA batteries.
Cell phone batteries are made of multiple flat rectangular lithium ion cells the size of a nickel.
The entire west needs to do this (Score:2)