"Companies like Urban Mining Corp are pioneering recovery from electronic waste, turning landfills into strategic materials."
When I first started prospecting 20 years ago I read somewhere that 95% of the worlds known gold was in the ground still and 95 % of the worlds known silver is in the landfills.
I'm sure those numbers have changed but still an interesting concept...
There’s a 3rd option. Politicians can be both dumb and paid off. Virtually all actions taken by politicians are made to keep or gain power. Despite all claims, very few care about the people in their states.
It has been my side job for the past couple of months to understand the REE situation. I have been disappointed to find such little activity in recycling. Is it difficult? Sure (lots of really tiny pieces to sort (more likely melt process) out), but it feels like a way faster track to success than building up domestic processing capacity given how, even under a semi-authoritarian approach to US government, I just can't see us getting capacity ramped up. I read somewhere, China pulled the passports of all the REE experts so we have to re-start processing tech we abandoned in the early 90s. That won't be easy so I predict a turtle race between that tech and environmental concerns. Maybe we can get enough capacity to keep F-35s and a few of the most key weapons (which makes a $400M investment in MP rock solid) but the AI-robotics (all those robot motors) will only happen in China if we don't get recycling going ASAP. Depending on how critical (and on balance good??) you think AI-robotics is to making the AI investment "good" might launch us into a Taoist question of what is good or bad in this situation.
I found a few companies developing the recycling angle but most are still private. Best (most advanced ??) public one I found was in Canada. I am not sure how long the US companies are going to remain private. It would be great (in my view) if we put as much or more investment into a US recycling company than we put in the mining (easy) and processing (really hard) route with MP. Lots of REE processing going on in Brazil. Hopefully if/when we figure out that Canada and Brazil are part of the solution to breaking the China stranglehold they won't remember the tariff gut/nose punches.
I am also curious if you have any thoughts on the efforts to create alternatives to REE (e.g., Materials Nexus (private UK), Niron Magnetics (US government funded for a while now with manufacturing in Minnesota)). Again, private so no investing angle yet and I don't have the connections or sleuthing skills to guess when and what type of investment plays are possible to get in early on these (same for the private US recyclers mentioned above). I so much prefer seeing one of these approaches to work over making our own visible from space toxic wasteland. MatNex claims they won't need to but....
"Companies like Urban Mining Corp are pioneering recovery from electronic waste, turning landfills into strategic materials."
When I first started prospecting 20 years ago I read somewhere that 95% of the worlds known gold was in the ground still and 95 % of the worlds known silver is in the landfills.
I'm sure those numbers have changed but still an interesting concept...
There’s a 3rd option. Politicians can be both dumb and paid off. Virtually all actions taken by politicians are made to keep or gain power. Despite all claims, very few care about the people in their states.
It has been my side job for the past couple of months to understand the REE situation. I have been disappointed to find such little activity in recycling. Is it difficult? Sure (lots of really tiny pieces to sort (more likely melt process) out), but it feels like a way faster track to success than building up domestic processing capacity given how, even under a semi-authoritarian approach to US government, I just can't see us getting capacity ramped up. I read somewhere, China pulled the passports of all the REE experts so we have to re-start processing tech we abandoned in the early 90s. That won't be easy so I predict a turtle race between that tech and environmental concerns. Maybe we can get enough capacity to keep F-35s and a few of the most key weapons (which makes a $400M investment in MP rock solid) but the AI-robotics (all those robot motors) will only happen in China if we don't get recycling going ASAP. Depending on how critical (and on balance good??) you think AI-robotics is to making the AI investment "good" might launch us into a Taoist question of what is good or bad in this situation.
I found a few companies developing the recycling angle but most are still private. Best (most advanced ??) public one I found was in Canada. I am not sure how long the US companies are going to remain private. It would be great (in my view) if we put as much or more investment into a US recycling company than we put in the mining (easy) and processing (really hard) route with MP. Lots of REE processing going on in Brazil. Hopefully if/when we figure out that Canada and Brazil are part of the solution to breaking the China stranglehold they won't remember the tariff gut/nose punches.
I am also curious if you have any thoughts on the efforts to create alternatives to REE (e.g., Materials Nexus (private UK), Niron Magnetics (US government funded for a while now with manufacturing in Minnesota)). Again, private so no investing angle yet and I don't have the connections or sleuthing skills to guess when and what type of investment plays are possible to get in early on these (same for the private US recyclers mentioned above). I so much prefer seeing one of these approaches to work over making our own visible from space toxic wasteland. MatNex claims they won't need to but....