The Elements of Innovation Discovered

(76) stories found containing 'critical materials institute'


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  • An image of a laser beam of light being converted into sound waves.

    Listening to light, sound to power tech

    A.J. Roan, Metal Tech News|Updated Oct 25, 2024

    Researchers merge light and sound on microchips, unlocking a new frontier in data processing, sensing, and communication. Microchips have always relied on electricity to process data, but what if they could harness sound instead? In a groundbreaking twist, researchers have managed to confine high-frequency sound waves to a chip's surface that ripple like a miniature earthquake – an unexpected breakthrough that could redefine everything from data processing to advanced sensing,...

  • Two pellets of high-assay low-enriched uranium stacked neatly.

    DOE awards $17M for HALEU fuel safety

    A.J. Roan, Metal Tech News|Updated Oct 2, 2024

    Funding supports 16 projects to advance safety and licensing of HALEU for nuclear reactors. Capitalizing on the now unlocked $2.7 billion to secure a domestic nuclear fuel supply, DOE has awarded $17 million to 16 projects aimed at criticality benchmarking for high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU). These projects, essential for advancing next-generation nuclear reactors, will provide the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) with the data needed to accelerate HALEU licens...

  • Molten aluminum being poured next to analysis machine.

    DTE analysis tech to optimize aluminum

    A.J. Roan, Metal Tech News|Updated Oct 1, 2024

    Combining AI with LP-LIBS, DTE's aluminum analysis cuts energy use and boosts efficiency. In the face of surging global demand for aluminum and rising energy costs, an Icelandic company is pioneering a new solution with its real-time melt analysis technology that promises to revolutionize aluminum production by providing immediate insights into molten metal composition, significantly cutting down on energy usage and production times while ensuring higher efficiency and...

  • A high-definition close-up photo of uranium concentrate or yellowcake.

    U.S. acts to secure domestic uranium supply

    A.J. Roan, Data Mine North|Updated Sep 26, 2024

    Russian uranium import ban ripples through clean energy sector. With the clock running down on uranium stockpiles, the U.S. faces an urgent need to secure its energy future. New legislation and significant investments are set to revive domestic production of this zero-carbon energy fuel, reduce reliance on foreign imports, and bolster national security –measures that aim to ensure a stable uranium supply for nuclear energy as the country races to meet its demands. In May 2...

  • Metallic tree with periodic element cobalt in roots.

    The highs and lows of critical cobalt

    K. Warner, Data Mine North|Updated Sep 26, 2024

    Will the controversial metal find its place in green tech? About 30 years ago, nobody thought much about cobalt. Today, this metal, with myriads of uses, is one of those elements that gets dragged into the spotlight due to the role it plays in electric vehicle batteries, with critics citing the disparity between the environmental and social costs of producing cobalt and the green tech solutions this critical metal enables. But we can't build a clean energy future without...

  • Solid gallium forms a liquid drop as it comes in contact with an open hand.

    Liquid gallium is stranger than assumed

    Shane Lasley, Metal Tech News|Updated Sep 4, 2024

    New study upends what scientists thought they knew about why gallium melts in your hand. As a metal that turns to liquid at near room temperature and has the uncanny ability to take on the catalytic properties of other metals, gallium is an enigmatic element that intrigues material scientists. The understanding of why gallium melts at 85.6 degrees Fahrenheit (29.8 degrees Celsius), however, may have been built on a foundation as solid as this strange metal during the midday...

  • A close-up image of lumps of coal.

    DOE invests more in coal-derived REEs

    A.J. Roan, Metal Tech News|Updated Aug 13, 2024

    Funding to support additional research in extracting rare earth elements from coal byproducts, enhancing sustainability and domestic supply. As part of ongoing efforts to bolster domestic supplies of critical minerals, the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management has announced an additional $10 million investment aimed at lowering costs and reducing the environmental impact of producing rare earth elements and other critical minerals from coal...

  • Michael Vanden Berg at a coal outcrop near Star Point mine.

    Rare earths found in Utah, Colorado mines

    K. Warner, Metal Tech News|Updated Aug 6, 2024

    High concentrations of REEs occurring near coal could improve domestic supply. "The model is if you're already moving rock, could you move a little more rock for resources towards energy transition?" said co-author Lauren Birgenheier regarding a study of rare earth elements (REEs) found in conjunction with coal-producing regional mines across the Uinta coal belt of Colorado and Utah. This research seeking out alternative sources of rare earths was conducted in partnership...

  • Inside the pit of a copper mine with hues of red, grey, and pink.

    Domestic "red metal" critical to America's clean energy future

    Gordon Neal|Updated Jun 13, 2024

    The United States and China are battling to secure stakes in copper mines around the world, and the stakes have never been higher. In a clash of titans, America and its free-market economy values compete against the Asian superpower with its stranglehold on copper resources and processing. With copper, the "red metal" critical to America's clean energy future, it's time to focus on developing domestic assets and amping up the country's process engineering. "We are in a second...

  • A woman and two men smiling in hard hats.

    U.S. seeks to rebuild mining workforce

    K. Warner, Metal Tech News|Updated May 27, 2024

    Policies and investments hinge on an incoming labor pool that sees mining in a modern light. With Washington's policies and cash infusions in full force to accelerate fair trade mineral and processing partnerships and develop a domestic supply, the U.S. mining sector must quickly find and train a new workforce to keep the industry producing. "The U.S. must ready the next generation of mining engineers, metallurgists, and geoscientists to develop the secure, transparent, and...

  • India's deep-sea exploration vehicle, the Matsya 6000

    China, Russia, India vie for sea minerals

    K. Warner, Metal Tech News|Updated Apr 5, 2024

    With the U.S. still out of undersea race to the bottom of international waters, India strives for greener way toward trillion-dollar resource. The United Nations International Seabed Authority (ISA) has approved 31 license applications for permission to explore international waters, with only two belonging to India from 2016. This is in comparison to China's five and Russia's four. Having never ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which led...

  • Impossible Metals co-founders Jason Gillham, Renee Grogan, Oliver Gunasekara.

    Sustainable deep-sea mining needed

    K. Warner, Metal Tech News|Updated Jan 29, 2024

    Metal Tech News Q&A with Oliver Gunasekara, CEO Impossible Metals. As an entrepreneur and business development executive, Oliver Gunasekara has left his mark on the tech world over the past 30-plus years. His latest project, Impossible Metals, is poised to be a real game-changer in the quest of deep sea mining for minerals critical to clean energy – which can and should maintain equal ESG standards to land-based mining. Rather than dredging the seafloor for precious p...

  • Evan Willing and Tyler Dabney set up tantalum cold spray equipment.

    Wisconsin makes fusion tantalum coating

    A.J. Roan, Metal Tech News|Updated Jan 20, 2024

    UW researchers explore capacity of tantalum cold spray technology to protect fusion reactors, prevent hydrogen loss. On the coattails of mankind's breakthrough in fusion technology, the University of Wisconsin-Madison is preemptively preparing a technology that could further stabilize the potential energy of a man-made micro-sun with a spray coating technology that could simultaneously maintain temperature integrity while also extracting the very fuel of a star – hydrogen. "...

  • Two roughly AA-sized sodium-ion batteries on top of a pile of table salt.

    Sodium-ion batteries promise potential

    Rose Ragsdale, For Metal Tech News|Updated Jan 20, 2024

    The world's transition away from fossil fuels to sustainable green energy sources is rapidly increasing the demand for economical storage methods that has thus far centered on lithium-ion batteries. The limited availability in the West of lithium and other critical metals, such as cobalt and rare earth elements, raises significant concern about the sustainability of the lithium-ion technology. One potential alternative may be the sodium-ion battery. According to the European...

  • Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau delivers a speech at Vitals’ REE plant.

    Top 10 Metal Tech News articles of 2023

    Shane Lasley, Metal Tech News|Updated Jan 4, 2024

    From Trudeau's visit to Vital REE plant to a Chinese firm buying Vital stock and Canada rare earths, MTN counts down the 10 most popular articles of 2023. From the energy transition driving enormous new demand for technology metals to advances in technologies that make the mining of those materials more efficient and sustainable, 2023 was a big year for tech metals and mining tech news. Here are the 10 most popular Metal Tech News articles of 2023: No. 10 - Trudeau tours Vital...

  • Ship loaded with colorful shipping containers going under highway bridge.

    Friendshoring balances domestic mining

    K. Warner, For Metal Tech News|Updated Dec 22, 2023

    On Dec. 12, 2015, delegates from almost every country on the planet signed a landmark climate accord, the Paris Agreement, that united more than 190 parties in support of a legally binding treaty pledging to drive the overall planetary temperature down by slashing the use of fossil fuels and adopting solutions for a massive transition to renewable energy and green transportation. This requires extensive economic and social transformation, measured in five-year cycles of...

  • Colorful balanced stones in shallow waters near a beach.

    Rare earths future hangs in the balance

    Shane Lasley, Data Mine North|Updated Nov 20, 2023

    A growing imbalance in the supply and demand for rare earths is creating a challenge for the companies that produce this suite of technology elements and an opportunity for the scientists seeking ways to leverage their unique properties in new and intriguing ways. While it is true that the global transition to zero-carbon energy and transportation is creating new rare earths demand that threatens to outstrip the global supply, the real disparity has more to do with which of...

  • Computer-generated image resembling a diamond used for technology.

    Diamond-studded quantum computer chips

    Shane Lasley, Metal Tech News|Updated Nov 6, 2023

    Trapping qubits inside diamonds, MIT researchers create memory nodes that may unlock quantum computing realm. Quantum computers have the potential to carry out calculations millions of times faster than today's most advanced supercomputers, but this game-changing computing power has yet to be realized due to the fragile nature of qubits, the quantum realm equivalent of the bits that store and transfer data in today's computers. Diamonds, however, could provide the armor that p...

  • An EV plugged into a battery charger on a sunny day.

    DOE invests $16M in solid battery tech

    Shane Lasley, Metal Tech News|Updated Sep 22, 2023

    To accelerate the commercialization of solid-state battery tech for EVs; redox flow batteries for grid-scale renewable energy storage. To speed the commercialization of emerging battery technologies, the U.S. Department of Energy is investing $11 million into solid-state batteries that promise to extend the range and reduce the fire risk of electric vehicles, and $5 million into flow batteries that can serve as a buffer between intermittent renewable power sources and...

  • The tan-colored MOXIE cube being placed into Perseverance.

    Mars MOXIE makes oxygen out of thin air

    A.J. Roan, Metal Tech News|Updated Sep 19, 2023

    First-ever space habitat tech, experiment gives more than researchers expected. Not too dissimilar from Man's first Moon landing with a computer that by today's standards TI-83 calculators could overpower, when the first astronauts land on Mars, they will most likely equivocate today's microwave oven-sized device for the air they breathe and the rocket propellant that gets them home as some clunky technology future generations will be amazed could accomplish what it did. But...

  • A 3D rendering of a future Redwood Materials facility.

    Strong Redwood attracts $1B investment

    A.J. Roan, Metal Tech News|Updated Sep 19, 2023

    From a small sprout to a mighty tree, Redwood Materials Inc. may share its roots with the Tree of Tesla but has grown into a pillar of stability in the realm of recycling amidst a time when electric vehicle battery materials are becoming increasingly difficult to source. This battery and e-waste startup's vision of creating a domestic supply through recycling has drawn nearly $2 billion in new investment to expand its operations in the U.S., spreading its own "Sequoian" roots...

  • Rows of solar panels at the Natural Bridges National Monument.

    Aluminum caught in green energy paradox

    A.J. Roan, Data Mine North|Updated Sep 11, 2023

    Aluminum has been classified as critical by the United States, European Union, Canada, and even China. At first glance, one may wonder how such a ubiquitous metal could possibly be critical. The answer is simply that aluminum is so widely used that supply, if endangered, could devastate an economy. In 2020, the World Bank identified aluminum as a "high-impact" and "cross-cutting" metal in all existing and potential green technologies. In spite of this, due to high energy...

  • A white-gloved hand holding uranium fuel pellets.

    Semantics strays uranium energy criticality

    A.J. Roan, Data Mine North|Updated Sep 11, 2023

    Powering nearly 10% of the world's energy needs and roughly 20% of America for over 50 years, nuclear energy is a highly controversial power provider that ticks all the boxes for zero-emission electricity. Much like most contemporary fuels, running these reactors takes something dug from the earth – uranium. In 2017, the United States Geological Survey was charged with identifying which minerals and metals are critical to the U.S. Its original list of 35 critical minerals, f...

  • A series of square brine-filled holes in the Salinas Grandes salt flats.

    Is a lithium triangle alliance coming?

    K. Warner, For Metal Tech News|Updated Aug 17, 2023

    Latin American countries collectively hold over 50% of the world's identified raw lithium. These resource-rich nations have begun asserting that they will no longer accept extractive international trade relationships-hoping to leverage this natural wealth of a suddenly in-demand mineral to bolster the region's development and encourage the growth of specialized industries and clean energy infrastructure. "We don't want to sell lithium to Europe ... we want to sell lithium vehi...

  • Rio Tinto’s Yarwun alumina refinery in Queensland, Australia.

    Mining heavyweights to build pilot plant

    Rose Ragsdale, For Metal Tech News|Updated Aug 8, 2023

    Rio Tinto and Sumitomo Corp. have teamed up to build a demonstration plant aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions from the production of aluminum. The A$111.1 million (US$73.9 million) pilot project, the first of its kind deployment of hydrogen calcination in the world, will be built in Australia at the Yarwun Alumina Refinery in Gladstone, Queensland. The project, co-sponsored by the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA), which contributed A$32.1 million (US$21.3 mil...

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