Rare Earth Materials: Global Supply and Industrial Use
Rare earth elements power much of today's advanced industry, and this book explains their role with a clear, technical approach. The text follows the full path from geology to end use, showing how these materials move through exploration, mining, beneficiation, cracking, solvent extraction, refining, metal production, and final component manufacturing. Each stage is examined with attention to the chemistry, engineering, capital requirements, and regulatory pressures that shape global capacity. Readers see why only a few regions control separation and high purity refining, why heavy rare earths remain the most constrained, and how these limits influence trade flows, pricing, and long term supply stability.
Applications receive equal depth. The book covers permanent magnets used in electric vehicles, wind turbines, robotics, aerospace, and defence, with explanations of grain boundary behaviour, diffusion treatments, and microstructural tuning. It reviews catalysts used in refineries and petrochemical plants, where rare earths stabilise zeolites, support redox cycles, and improve conversion efficiency. It examines lasers, optical fibres, displays, sensors, alloys, ceramics, electronic components, medical imaging agents, and nuclear medicine isotopes. Each application connects physical properties to industrial performance, showing why rare earths remain difficult to replace.
Economic drivers and demand trends appear throughout. The text outlines how electrification, renewable energy projects, automation, advanced manufacturing, and medical technology expand rare earth use. It also assesses future scenarios based on EV growth, offshore wind capacity, grid upgrades, and emerging technologies in photonics.
Economic drivers and demand trends appear throughout. The text outlines how electrification, renewable energy projects, automation, advanced manufacturing, and medical technology expand rare earth use. It also assesses future scenarios based on EV growth, offshore wind capacity, grid upgrades, and emerging technologies in photonics, quantum systems, and precision robotics. Supply constraints, trade disruptions, environmental rules, and midstream bottlenecks are explained using real industrial mechanisms rather than abstract models.
The result is a technical, structured reference for engineers, analysts, policymakers, investors, and professionals who need to understand how rare earth materials shape technology, industry, and global supply risk. The book offers a practical and detailed examination of one of the most influential material systems driving modern economic and industrial development.
Customer Reviews
ThriftBooks® and the ThriftBooks® logo are registered trademarks of Thrift Books Global, LLC
