Projects in Response
With the
facts about rare earth metals coming to light and the controversy surrounding
them growing, the immediacy for alternatives is becoming clear. While the media
has begun to uncover the devastation caused by the mining, processing, and
disposal of these materials around the world, a few organizations have risen to
offer solutions to the daunting problems surrounding Rare Earth Metals. Though
they are far from the medias spotlight, they may hold the key to solving the
issues of our dependency on exhaustible resources.
CRM_InnoNet,
or Critical Raw Material Innovation Network is a project in the EU dedicated to
finding and organizing efforts for sustainable alternatives to rare earth materials around the world. With the impending
scarcity of resources that many of our technologies depend on, including the
aerospace, automotive and machinery industries, finding suitable alternatives
is an inevitable investment. CRM_Innonet is the European Commission’s attempt
to do just that. CRM objectives are to map the rare metal substitutions projects
around the world, develop a criteria for the assessment of those projects, and create
“Roadmaps” for companies to follow in order to move away from dependency on
exhaustible materials and into to a place of alternative solutions. This combined
with their network of organizations looking for alternative solutions will
allow CRM to begin creating policy recommendations for any company or industry
attempting to contribute to the solution of Critical Raw Materials by reducing
their dependency on those materials.
CRM is
modeled after CMI, or the Critical Materials Institute, the U.S. Department of
Energy’s approach to creative solutions to our dependency on rare earth
materials. Ames Laboratory is a national laboratory of the DOE and leads the
CMI, which brings together the top researchers and developers in the field with
the most cutting edge equipment available. CMI is an Energy Innovation Hub that
coordinates over 250 researchers across 18 institutions involved in the
alternatives to rare earth materials. With a budget of 120 million dollars from
the DOE the CMI is leading the way for a technological reform around the world,
void of rare earth materials. In only their second year as an organization they
have already accomplished a great deal, including hosting the Trilateral
Critical Materials Working Group, which is a collaborative efforts between the
EU, The US and Japan to reduce the global dependency on rare earth metals.
Many of other projects exist, like
ARPA.E’s REACT, or Rare Earth Alternatives in Critical technologies, which
focuses on alternatives to specific issues like the need for magnetic equipment that
powers electric vehicles and wind turbines. Or RETA, the Rare Earth Technology
Alliance that acts as liaison’s to wide range of companies from General
Electric to ReNew Erath Metals, streaming information and data from producers
and manufactures to post consumer recyclers insuring the highest efficiency in
the life span of rare earth materials. With organizations around the world
working to find solutions to our dependency on rare earth metals, it’s only a
matter of time before human innovation and collaborative efforts leads to world
of technological advances void of the high cost of materials and resources we
depend on today.
Next Week; The Future in Rare Earth Metals
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