A few weeks ago, there was a professor talking on a UK radio show, about the
eco-credentials of the windmills that are springing up all over the UK in an
effort to satisfy the goals for renewable power, that have been foisted on
us by Brussels. He enthused like an evangelical preacher about the brilliant
efficiency of these machines which, he said, was due in no small part to the
use of neodymium magnets in the generators. I understand that high power
neodymium magnets are also used in the motors for electric eco-cars. Fair
enough all round. However, in last Sunday's newspaper supplement, I read a
rather disturbing story about this material. Apparently, almost all 'rare
earth' metals are mined and processed in China. Since the boom in wind
turbines and electric cars started, the demand for neodymium has gone sky
high. The only problem is that extracting it from the ground and other
metals that it co-exists with, involves the use of very concentrated acids
which are pumped into the ground, as well as being used in the refinement
process. There is also radioactivity involved somewhere in the process. Once
the neodymium has been extracted and processed, the highly acidic and
radioactive 'tailings' are dumped in a huge and highly toxic lake that is
now over 10 feet deep. Local people are getting sick and dying at an
alarming rate, and birth defects are common. The water supply and crops are
being poisoned, and the whole affair is being talked of in terms of an
"ecological disaster".

So here we have another bit of western eco- think of dubious practicality in
terms of the amount of power that can actually be realistically produced
this way, that's having a seriously negative ecological effect on the other
side of the world. But I suppose all the eco-warriors and euro pen-pushers
that support this 'non-polluting' power generation technology, would rather
that we didn't know about the wider implications ...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/mosl...ous-scale.html

Arfa