Hybrids Driving Rare Earth Interest, N Saskatoon deposit growing in significance

I hope they're going to get (or already are) really efficient with recycling this stuff. Doesn't mining present ill affects on the environment, even far from the source due to water contamination?

 

Yes, Recycling of batteries is standard on any car that is junked.

Toyota pays a $200 bounty on all Hybrid Batteries. This makes them worth pulling out. Let alone to recycle.

As resources get scarce the price on items goes up and also the salvage value.

Look at Platinum, 7 years ago it was trading at around $400 per ounce. Now...its hovers around 1300 more or less.

Look at gold. Its been constantly recycled for at least the last 6000 years. About 1/3 of my products are made from gold that has been recycled out of old computers, the rest from recycled shavings and old rings.

Even watch batteries are silver oxide batteries. Jewelers save them when you get a new watch battery. They add up, they are mostly silver.

All industries recycle what is economical to recycle because there is money in it and it just makes sense.

There is no doubt that the cost of the materials to make batteries are going to go up.

Along with that the value of old products made of such things also goes up.

The $200 battery bounty is a Japanese Idea that goes back a ways. Most Americans will be bothered by this but it makes sense.

When you get something new, you pay a tax or a deposit recycling premium, in this case $200 is added to the Prius to cover the battery. WE PRIUS OWNERS PAID IT, its included in the cost.
that $200 goes into an account. When the car is done, wrecked or is on its last legs as a barely running wonder. The company that made the item is responsible for it and dismantling it. The deposit money is paid to those who bring it in for reuse. It adds the economic incentive to bring it back, and once back, reprocessed into something new.

Because of the demand on things like nickel we will probably see it shifting use. most nickel is currently used for coinage. No doubt yet again in the next several years our coinage will change to a less expensive and less valuable metal in time as its worth more in batteries than pocket change.

We must also remember in 20 years no everyone is going to be bale to afford a car as we now know them. And not all cars and transportation will use batteries. There will probably be mechanical storage of energy in some systems as well as battery and liquid still in others.

There will no doubt be new forms of energy storage being worked on as well and forms of transportation. What...I have no idea. but as time moves on we find solutions.

 

As far as I can tell, rare earths are in the exhaust system, along with neodymium in the big electrical motor magnets. No info here on recycling those, yet. Anyone?

The big battery features nickel and a splash of cobalt. Toyota's recycling system already discussed here. In practice, most Prius fail as a result of crashes, and many of those batteries get sold into other uses. With nickel now above $15/lb, a feller would be a fool to throw that big box into a landfill! At those prices, Toyota's $200 offer is lowball. It was generous, back in the day, when I bought the car and nickel sold for $3/lb.

Tangential: how Toyota is going to vastly increase their output of NiMH vehicles with Ni prices that high (or higher), I just don't understand. Have not seen neodymium price trends yet, but yeah, that too.

 

ROC: Rockwood Holdings inc.

http://www.rockwoodspecialties.com/rock_en...tm/pr_1_07d.htm

Take it to the bank. I think this stock is going to go through the roof. Lithium batteries baby.