The Japanese government has set aside some $1.2 billon for...

The Japanese government has set aside some $1.2 billon for research into rare earth recycling, as well as opening new supply routes and the stockpiling of REEs. As part of this push, Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry selected Tokyo based Hitachi for a project to find technology solutions for the recycling of rare earth metals from 'urban mines'.


Hitachi has developed a method to recycle high-performance rare earth magnets from the motors of hard disk drives (HDD), air conditioners and other compressors. Specifically, it has developed machinery to separate rare earth magnets from end-of-life products, and then to extract REEs from rare earth magnets. Experiments of neodymium and dysprosium extraction technologies were conducted using a dry process rather than using acids and other chemicals.


For HDDs, a drum type unit spins to shake and prang the HDDs continuously, which loosens screws and disassembles the HDDs into their structural components such as the casing, disk, and rare earth magnet. Because the components containing rare earth magnets emerge from the machinery separately, workers can pick out the desired components easily by visual screening. Non rare earth materials are removed, heat is applied to distil the excess extraction material, and rare earths alloy remains.


The machine has a capacity to process around 100 magnets per hour - around eight times faster than using manual labour. Hitachi aims to commence full recycling operations by 2013.

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Meanwhile, automotive catalysts enjoy a very high recycling rate. However, the process is focused on the recovery of valuable platinum group metals. The recovery of the REE content, mainly cerium, from these catalysts has not yet become a focus. Currently these elements are moved into the slags from smelter processes due to the high affinity of the REE to oxygen. With the low cost of Cerium it's debatable as to whether recovery of REE from spent automotive catalysts will be prominent in the future.


The recovery of REE from lighting is however taking place. According to Mark Smith, president and CEO of Molycorp, which claims to be the western hemisphere's only producer of rare earth oxide, rare earth phosphors in compact fluorescent light bulbs are prime for recycling. Europium, yttrium and terbium are used in a powdery form in the light bulb itself. These powdered rare earths can be reprocessed and reconstituted for use by light bulb manufacturers.