Over the past several years, speculators and supply-chain instabilities have forced up the price of rare-earth elements (REEs) such as neodymium and dysprosium, and the strong, thermally stable magnets they produce. In the months since last summer's price peak, the speculation bubble may have deflated somewhat, but the cost of REEs remains elevated compared to what it was even five years ago, and looks to remain that way for the foreseeable future. That will have a continuing impact on the cost of permanent magnet motors, which affects a range of applications in the industrial automation space, as well as transportation and renewable energy.
In part three of this five-part Design News series on rare earth materials, we'll look at research underway to develop REE-sparing and REE-free magnets. (Read part 1 here. Read part 2 here.)
In the US, the Department of Energy has identified REEs critical to a range of application areas like renewable energy and electric vehicles. (Source: US Department of Energy)
When neodymium magnets emerged, they offered mixed performance -- high flux, but only modest resistance to demagnetization and limited thermal range. The price of REEs kept dropping, though, encouraging the research community to focus on optimizing the magnets and motor designs. “It was consistent,” says Alan Crapo, VP of engineering at NovaTorque Inc. “(The magnets) just kept getting better and the price just kept going down every year and we thought wow, this is really cool.” But then the price of neodymium began to shoot up. Suddenly, seeking alternatives became more appealing.
In the US, the Department of Energy has identified REEs critical to a range of application areas like renewable energy and electric vehicles. In response, the Advanced Research Projects Agency -- Energy (ARPA-E) has launched the Rare Earth Alternatives in Critical Technologies (REACT) program, which currently funds 14 different projects to develop REE-sparing and REE free-magnets. At the University of Delaware, for example, seminal neodymium magnet developer George Hadjipanayis is hard at work on the synthesis of nanoparticles that could yield nanostructured rare earth magnets with 30 percent or 40 percent lower neodymium content than their macro counterparts.
The group is using a "bottom-up" approach to produce an anisotropic exchange-coupled magnet. Exchange-coupled magnets feature a mixture of magnetically "soft" (low coercive force) materials like iron and magnetically "hard" (high coercive force) materials like samarium cobalt or neodymium iron boron. Existing exchange-coupled magnets may consist of as much as 50 percent of magnetically soft material, which means less of the expensive REEs.
That's the good news. The bad news is that current versions tend to be isotropic. That is, the magnetic domains of the individual grains/particles tend to be randomly aligned, which limits their energy products to, at best, on the order of 20 MGOe (for comparison, neodymium magnets have energy products on the order of 55 MGOe).
Glad to see there is a real effort underway to create and work to manufacture nanoscale structures that can serve as alternatives to rare earth materials given all the controversy over their ability. Obviously, as we have seen from the pursuit of alternative fuel and EV battery technologies, this kind of innovation process takes time and with every win, there is a setback. All part of the process, however, and I'm glad to see that are myriad efforts underway. The wider range of projects on the table, the better the shot that one of them will be on the money.
Kristin, Excellent article. Any idea how much price premium % the shortage of REEs is adding to permanent magnet motors? I'm curious how much of an impact the shortage might have in this area. Also, wondering if the performance of the new materials will meet or surpass current performance standards. Thanks.
Beth, this is a good example of adversity spurring innovation. While some of the techniques and technologies may not pan out, they may well lead to new discoveries themselves. I am especially impressed by the efforts in nano materials that this entails.
apresher, that is an interesting question. Another way to ask that is to ask what is the typical percentage of the cost of a motor that the magnets comprise. Is there any rule of thumb on that, Kristin?
At some point, rare earth elements will be plentiful again. Mines in the U.S., Australia and Afghanistan will begin producing plenty of materials. By then, however, alternatives may be available. Speculators may be shooting themselves in their collective foot.
One interesting point to remember is that the mines in the US closed down becuase prices had dropped so much. What happens next time they drop? Do we become dependent on another supplier that will manipulate the price for their own purposes?
I agree, Naperlou. And the only way we can get past the adversity is to have lots of competitive projects motivated by a sense of urgency. As a rule, materials innovation doesn't happen in a rush.
That's a really good question, Naperlou. With new sources found in Afghanistan, a mine again active in Australia and working getting down to create alternatives to rare earth elements, it seems inevitable the supply will exceed demand in a few short years.
No question that prices are up. On the motor side, I tend to talk to engineers rather than sales folks, so I don't have exact numbers.Last November, IMS Research analyst Jenelea Howell predicted that the average price of servomotors would jump by 9.3% in 2012. That number may have softened because of stabilizing prices for REEs, but the materials are still up significantly from their price of four or five years ago. In some cases, manufacturers have written the cost into their contracts, along the lines of the fuel surcharge that airport limo services began using a few years ago. Lenze, For example, has a page on their website explaining a fuel surcharge that scales for increasing neodymium and dysprosium prices relative to their March 2011 values.
That's a good question, naperlou. I have a query out to one of my motor guys to see what he has to say about it. Obviously, that rule of thumb is likely to be wildly distorted over the past several years, which explains the introduction of the magnet surcharge.
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