The new 3.0 MW direct drive permanent magnet generator wind turbine from Siemens (image courtesy of Siemens Energy)

There has been much interest in the development of direct drive systems in recent years, since the elimination of the gear box theoretically the turbine system more reliable.  What Siemens appears to have done is to take that a step further – by eliminating half of the components at the top of the tower, there is less maintenance for the service technicians to have to worry about.  This is good for onshore systems, but even more valuable for wind turbines that are to be located offshore, far from land. It also means, in theory, more uptime for each turbine, thus allowing them to produce electricity over wider intervals.

Siemens installed the first prototype of the SWT-3.0-101 at the beginning of December 2009 close to the town of Brande in Denmark. Siemens entered the wind energy business through the acquisition of the Danish company Bonus Energy A/S approximately five years ago, a company that had been in business since 1980, as Danregn Vindkraft. This company was a pioneer in the early days of recent interest in wind power, and was a logical acquisition for Siemens as it looked to enter the market. The Siemens Wind Power business unit is still headquartered in Brande. The permanent magnet generator is being produced by the Large Drives business unit within the Siemens Industry Sector.

The compact nature of the nacelle for the new wind turbine from Siemens means that it is easier to transport than other systems (image courtesy of Siemens Energy)

Siemens first tested direct drive systems in the form of two 3.6 MW concept turbines in July 2008, leading to the 3.0 MW prototype installed late last year. While Siemens acknowledges that they were not the first to market with a direct drive permanent magnet generator system, the company appears to have deliberately taken its time with the development of its own systems. In a news release from late last year, Mr. Stiesdal indicated that rushing to the market with immature technology was not an option for Siemens. While the nacelle contains new technology, the blades, rotor hub, tower and controller were developed from existing products. Full commercial launch of the new turbine through serial production, is expected to commence next year, with a number of systems being installed around the world in the meantime.

One comment from Siemens is worthy of note for the permanent magnet industry and its supply chain. In a promotional video that was released to coincide with the launch of the new turbine, Ernst Frendesen, Director of Global Sales and Proposals for Siemens said that the

“market demand that we expect on this machine will be extremely big and therefore for a period, we think that the magnet demand will outweigh the production capacity.”

This is a very significant comment. Attempts to ascertain the specific amount of permanent magnet materials used in SWT-3.0-101 turbine design were declined by the company for reasons of confidentiality, and so at the moment it is difficult to determine just what this statement means, and on what basis it was made. It is clear, however, that Siemens is putting the permanent magnet industry [and indirectly, the rare earths supply chain] on notice.

Schematic of the new 3.0 MW direct drive permanent magnet generator wind turbine from Siemens (image courtesy of Siemens Energy)

Mr. Stiesdal has kindly agreed to do an interview with me on the SWT-3.0-101 wind turbine and its direct drive, permanent magnet-based drive system, which I will post to Terra Magnetica once completed, along with any other developments in the area of DD PMG turbines as they happen.

Over the past few days, Australia’s ABC Radio National broadcast not one, but two items on rare earth metals, to both of which I heartily recommend listening.

The first item was broadcast on the Breakfast program on Friday, and lasts a little over 6 minutes.  It’s an introductory piece on the subject, but spends significant time discussing the environmental issues surrounding rare earth production in Australia. You can listen to the piece on the program’s Rare Earths Metals segment Web page or by clicking below:

ABC Radio National Breakfast: Rare Earth Metals

The second piece, first broadcast on the Background Briefing program this past Sunday morning, lasts for over 45 minutes and is an comprehensive, in-depth study of the rare earth metals, their markets and associated supply chain, environmental and political issues.There is also a pretty decent-sized portion on rare earth permanent magnets and their applications, for which, in the interests of full disclosure, I was interviewed :-)

As producer and narrator Stan Correy says:

China currently produces about 95% of the world’s rare earths, which are metals which are essential to modern living and used all around us every day. In business it’s a volatile mix, with complex political alchemy for every government, including Australia.

The program features several interviews of a variety of individuals from a number of different sectors, in addition to yours truly.

You can listen to the piece on the Background Briefing Rare Earths and China program Web page or by clicking below:

ABC Radio National Background Briefing: Rare Earths and China

Stan did a great job in explaining what can be a difficult subject to convey.  He also included a link back to Terra Magnetica – so thanks, Stan, for that!

Oct. 27, 2009 – by Tracey Bryant – The University of Delaware has won a $4.4 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA-E) to lead a multidisciplinary, multi-institutional research project to develop the next generation of high-performance permanent magnets.

Stronger magnets are essential for increasing the energy efficiency of electronics, automobiles, information technology, and communications systems in the 21st-century, and for supporting the development of hybrid/electric vehicles, wind turbines, environmentally friendly transportation systems, and new energy storage systems, among other applications.

The UD project is one of 37 selected nationwide by the agency, collectively totaling $151 million, which “have great potential to revolutionize the U.S. energy sector,” according to Shane Kosinski, ARPA-E’s acting deputy director. They represent the first round of projects funded under ARPA-E, which is receiving $400 million to deploy under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

George Hadjipanayis, the Richard B. Murray Professor of Physics and chairperson of the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Delaware, is the principal investigator on the project. He will coordinate a team of chemists, material scientists, physicists, and engineers from the University of Delaware, University of Nebraska, Northeastern University, and Virginia Commonwealth University; the U.S. Department of Energy’s Ames Laboratory at Iowa State University, in Ames, Iowa; and the Electron Energy Corporation in Landisville, Pa.

According to Hadjipanayis, the strongest permanent magnets today are made from an alloy of three elements: neodymium (Nd), iron (Fe), and boron (B). Hadjipanayis was one of the three researchers who discovered the Nd-Fe-B magnets in the early 1980s.

In the new project, he and his team will be working to identify new materials that will result in magnets twice as strong as those currently in existence.

“This is the first time that such a large concerted effort will be undertaken in the U.S. on the development of high-energy magnets that involves the best expertise available in our country on this type of materials,” Hadjipanayis said.

An article in the Sept. 11, 2009, edition of the journal Science reported that the demand for Nd-Fe-B magnets is growing at about 15 percent per year, for use in products ranging from magnetic resonance imaging machines, to cell phones, headphones, and even prototype magnetic refrigerators. Yet neodymium (Nd), which is a member of the rare earth metals on the periodic table of the elements, is growing increasingly scarce.

The UD-led team will explore three different routes over the three-year project, Hadjipanayis said. The first route will be to discover new materials in tertiary rare earth-transition metal-element X systems that have not yet been explored due to synthesis difficulties such as vapor pressure, high reactivity, toxicity, or their refractory nature. The second route will be to develop materials that are free of rare earth metals and stabilized by the addition of small non-magnetic atoms (Fe-Co-X); and the third route will be to use the bottom-up approach to develop high-energy nanocomposite materials consisting of a uniform and nanoscale mixture of high anisotropy hard (Nd-Fe-B) and high magnetization soft (Fe) magnetic phases.

“We hope our efforts will provide the fundamental innovations and breakthroughs which could have a major impact in re-establishing the United States as a leader in the science, technology, and commercialization of this very important class of materials,” Hadjipanayis said.

More than 3,600 concept papers were received in response to the first ARPA-E solicitation, from which the U.S. Department of Energy requested 300 full applications and ultimately selected 37 based on rigorous review and evaluation.

Funding for the projects is provided through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), also known as the federal stimulus package, which was enacted by Congress earlier this year.

Jack asks the questions: “why are the components being made in China? Can we do anything to cause them to be made in the USA?“.  He goes on to discuss the opacity of Chinese rare earth mining companies in terms of true cost structures, and how virtual all rare earth permanent magnets used in large scale wind turbines, probably originated in China.

Jack goes on to say:

These are the current consequences of the non-production of any but trivial amounts of the rare earths outside of China, combined with the economic thinking of America’s business and government elites; the former want to maximize profit at any cost, the latter want revenue from the taxes on those profits.

The rest of Jack’s article talks about the issues of investing in hard rock mining, and rare earth mining in particular, in order to exploit the significant natural resources available to us in the USA and Canada. he says that:

Chinese and Japanese companies are now looking at these North American resources for the benefits of the economies of their home countries. They can only do this so long as North America does not any longer have a domestic supply chain to refine, produce metals and alloys, produce components, and assemble those components into end use products.

The article is a good primer on the present problems facing this industry, and how they could impact rare earth permanent magnet supply in the future. You can read Jack’s article here.

]]> http://www.terramagnetica.com/2009/11/12/the-problems-of-sourcing-wind-turbines-and-rare-earth-metals-from-china/feed/ 0 http://www.terramagnetica.com/2009/11/08/dmtc-hosts-2nd-annual-strategic-materials-conference/ http://www.terramagnetica.com/2009/11/08/dmtc-hosts-2nd-annual-strategic-materials-conference/#comments Sun, 08 Nov 2009 17:23:41 +0000 Gareth Hatch http://www.terramagnetica.com/?p=747 The Defense Metals Technology Center [DMTC], based in North Canton, Ohio, is hosting its 2nd Annual Strategic Materials Conference [SMC] during Feb 1-2, 2010 in Cleveland, Ohio.

According to the DMTC Web site:

The Defense Metals Technology Center (DMTC) was formed in January, 2007 in order to establish an industrial base capable of affordably producing such strategic metals. The organization addresses the identified needs of the U.S. Military in the development and manufacture of vital defense materials.

The DMTC indicates that the first SMC, held in April of last year, involved more than 110 participants from the USA and abroad.  The DMTC Web site goes on to say:

Building on the success of the inaugural Strategic Materials Conference in April 2009, the Defense Metals Technology Center will convene SMC 2010. This event will focus principally on rare earth metals, building on the well-received panel discussion on high performance magnets and a Rare Earth Metals Strategic Sourcing Forum to be sponsored by the DMTC in November 2009.

Unlike the first event in this series, which was invitation-only, the DMTC has apparently opened attendance at this meeting to anyone that registers.  More details on the event can be found at the SMC Web site.

Held every two years, the Workshop was inaugurated in 1974 by Karl Strnat, in Dayton, Ohio, and has been a success ever since. I have no hesitation in saying that, in my opinion, it is the most important technical / scientific meeting on the calendar for anyone involved in the science, engineering, procurement and production of rare earth permanent magnets.  It’s always a great mix of formal and informal sessions and activities, and there is a unique, friendly atmosphere that I’ve not encountered at many such meetings.

In the Call for Abstracts, Professor Spomenka Kobe, Workshop Chair, and Dr. Boris Saje, Workshop Co-Chair, said:

In order that we can begin to schedule talks and posters, we would like to invite you to submit one-page abstracts describing your latest research findings. These abstracts should be sent as an e-mail attachment to REPM10@ijs.si, no later than Monday, 1 February 2010, indicating a preference for oral or poster presentation.

The Organizing Committee is interested in abstracts covering any area of rare earth permanent magnets, but they are particularly interested to receive suggestions for presentation on:

• Markets & Raw Materials: Current Status and Future Trends
• Processing Techniques
• Thin-film Magnets
• Magnet Applications
• High-Temperature Magnets
• Nanocrystalline / Nanocomposite and Bulk Amorphous Magnets
• Magnetic Modelling
• Recent Advances in Structural Analysis Techniques
• Progress Towards Textured Nanocomposites
• Coercivity and Intrinsic Physical Properties
• MAGMAS Materials and Devices
• Non-Rare-Earth PMs (excluding oxides)
• RE-TM with other properties, for example, magnetostriction, magnetocalorics, magnetic shape memory
• Magnetism and Nanotechnology

Once the abstracts have been accepted, the deadline for the submission of papers will be Monday, May 3, 2010. This deadline will be strictly enforced, because one of the nice traditions of the Workshop series is that the Proceedings of the meeting are available to attendees when they arrive at the meeting.  Having been involved in the organization of the Birmingham REPM Workshop in 1994, I can tell you that it is no mean feat putting these Proceedings together in such a short period of time – dealing with that many academics and other “busy” people is akin to the herding of a large quantity of particularly independent cats!

The organizers will send out further information on the submission of papers and logistical details with acceptance notifications for the abstracts on Friday, February 26, 2010.

The REPM10 Call for Abstracts goes on to say:

Workshop attendees who submit a paper will be required to pay their reduced-rate Workshop registration fee of €620 (€300 for students) by [Monday, May 3, 2010]. For those people who register later the regular rate will be €750 (€400). Registration fee for accompanying persons will be only €150.

The Workshop fee includes registration for the scientific sessions, a copy of the Workshop Proceedings, a welcome reception on [Sunday, August 29, 2010], a lunch and coffee breaks during each day of the Workshop, the Workshop Dinner, as well as evening activities.

You can get further details from the Workshop webpage at http://nano.ijs.si/repm10.htm – see you there!

Section 843 includes language from the original House Bill used almost verbatim in the final law.  It requires that

“not later than April 1, 2010, the Comptroller General shall submit to the Committees on Armed Services of the Senate and House of Representatives a report on rare earth materials in the supply chain of the Department of Defense”.

The law states that the report must address, at a minimum, the following:

1. An analysis of the current and projected domestic and worldwide availability of rare earths for use in defense systems, including an analysis of projected availability of these materials in the export market.
2. An analysis of actions or events outside the control of the Government of the United States that could restrict the access of the Department of Defense to rare earth materials, such as past procurements and attempted procurements of rare earth mines and mineral rights.
3. A determination as to which defense systems are currently dependent on, or projected to become dependent on, rare earth materials, particularly neodymium iron boron magnets, whose supply could be restricted (A) by actions or events identified pursuant to paragraph (2); or (B) by other actions or events outside the control of the Government of the United States.
4. The risk to national security, if any, of the dependencies (current or projected) identified pursuant to paragraph (3).
5. Any steps that the Department of Defense has taken or is planning to take to address any such risk to national security.
6. Such recommendations for further action to address the matters covered by the report as the Comptroller General considers appropriate.

The law defines the term `rare earth’ to mean the lanthanoids (atomic numbers 57-71) plus yttrium and scandium. The anomalous reference to thorium as a rare earth in the earlier language of the bill, is now absent.  The term `rare earth material’ includes rare earth ores, semi-finished rare earth products, and components containing rare earth materials.

Having just attended the Critical & Strategic Metals Conference in Washington, DC, I was struck by anecdotes from government employees, on how timeframes of 9 months and longer, for not dissimilar reports, were not enough time to do their work as well as they would have liked.  April 1, 2010 is only 5 months away. Are these guys going to be able to do a thorough-enough job, to get Congress the information it needs?

We shall see.

Joining the USMMA in this capacity are:

• Jack Lifton, of Jack Lifton LLC and The Jack Lifton Report, who is a well known commentator and consultant with over 47 years of experience in the field of rare earth, platinum group and other minor metals, with a wealth of knowledge on the mining, refining, production and end uses of these metals;
• Stan Trout, of Spontaneous Materials, who is a highly-respected permanent magnet materials consultant, and one of the best teachers on the subject of permanent magnets around today. Stan has over 30 years experience in a variety of roles within the permanent magnets industry;
• Tony Morcos, of ACM Magnetics, who has significant experience in the end use and design of applications that use permanent magnets and electromagnets, and brings a valuable, alternative perspective to the issues facing rare earth usage and design optimization.

Previous postings here at Terra Magnetica, have touched on the work of all three of these guys, and their combined talents and experience bring significant new “bench strength” to the USMMA. The additions are a pretty smart move as this organization and others, such as the Rare Earth Information and Technology Association [REITA], face the challenges and hurdles associated with getting a viable rare earth supply chain up and running in North America.

Rather than re-hashing what has been already been shared elsewhere online about the meeting – here are some links to great articles on the meeting from Lisa Reisman (co-chair of the meeting) and Stuart Burns from Metal Miner:

• Supply Risk Management and Rare Earth Metals a Big Disconnect
• Electric Cars Could Pose a Challenge to Rare Earth Supply in “Nightmare Scenario”
• Displacing China as a Rare Earth Producer is No Small Feat
• Rare Earths, Critical and Strategic Metals and the US Legislative Agenda
• Rare Earth Metals Conference: Electric Vehicle Demand
• To Stockpile or Not to Stockpile that is the Rare Earth Question

In addition, Tracy Weslowsky of Wescow, a Founding Editor of RareMetalBlog, posted a thought-provoking piece at the RareMetalBlog based on the perspective she presented during a panel discussion at the meeting:

• Bubble Debate on Investment Opportunities in Critical and Strategic Metals

Finally, co-chair Jack Lifton last week published a well-timed, new article called The Rare Earth Crisis of 2009 which was circulating during the meeting, and is well worth a read.

I heartily recommend that you read each and every one of these links, to get an idea of what is going on in this important area. Well done to Lisa Reisman, Jack Lifton, the folks at Infocast, and to all of the speakers andpanelists, for a job well done.

Candidly, I came away with the distinct impression that although we now know where we can get the raw materials necessary for the growth of the technology metals sector – the question that needs to be answered is this: who is going to refine these materials and turn them into useful metals & alloys?  In the absence of such capabilities in North America, we will once again be heavily reliant on the good graces of our colleagues in China…

• Key Questions Necessary to Ask of the Critical Metals Industry
•  Do Stockpiles Work?
• Rare Earths – The Problem Child and Attention Deficit America
• The ‘Alternative Energy’ Metals
• Lithium Supply – Abundant Supply or At Risk?
• Mapping Supply Risk to Specific Sourcing Strategies
• Government Action in the Strategic Materials Market
• Is the Resource Base Available for the Scaling of Wind, Solar and Energy Storage?

There are of course plenty of other sessions too. I’ll try to post my thoughts and perspective on this meeting later this week, being particular mindful to note any commentary and perspective presented on the supply chain for permanent magnet materials, and their end uses.