The resources race is on. Powering our digital lives and green technologies are some of the Earth’s most precious metals — but they are running out. And what will happen when they do? The green-tech revolution has been lauded as the silver bullet to a new world. One that is at last free of oil, pollution, shortages, and cross-border tensions. Drawing on six years of research across a dozen countries, this book cuts across conventional green thinking to probe the hidden, dark side of green technology. By breaking free of fossil fuels, we are in fact setting ourselves up for a new dependence — on rare metals such as cobalt, gold, and palladium. They are essential to electric vehicles, wind turbines, solar panels, our smartphones, computers, tablets, and other everyday connected objects. China has captured the lion’s share of the rare metals industry, but consumers know very little about how they are mined and traded, or their environmental, economic, and geopolitical costs. The Rare Metals War is a vital exposé of the ticking time-bomb that lies beneath our new technological order. It uncovers the reality of our lavish and ambitious environmental quest that involves risks as formidable as those it seeks to resolve.

This reference book makes it easy for anyone involved in materials selection, or in the design and manufacture of metallic structural components to quickly screen materials for a particular application. Information on practically all ferrous and nonferrous metals including powder metals is presented in tabular form for easy review and comparison between different materials. Included are chemical compositions, physical and mechanical properties, manufacturing processes, applications, pertinent specifications and standards, and test methods. Contents Overview: Glossary of metallurgical terms Selection of structural materials (specifications and standards, life cycle and failure modes, materials properties and design, and properties and applications) Physical data on the elements and alloys Testing and inspection Chemical composition and processing characteristics

Risk assessment of metals may need specific guidance in how to handle natural background, essentiality, and long historical use of metals. It may also be necessary to take bio-availability into account. The aim of the present project was to critically review proposals on principles for risk assessment of metals (MERAG), developed by the metals industry, in co-operation with the UK Government during 2005-2006. The different MERAG proposals were reviewed by different Nordic consultancies, and their views are summarised in the report. The project was initiated and coordinated by the Nordic Risk Assessment Project (NORAP), which receives funding from the Nordic Chemicals group, a subgroup to the Nordic Council of Ministers. This review was considered urgent, in order to be prepared for a possible proposal to implement the MERAG principles within the Technical Guidance Document on Chemical Safety Assessment, which is developed for use under the REACH regulation.

Includes monthly "Abstracts of recent literature relating to non-ferrous and ferrous metals."

In recent years, urbanization and industrialization have produced large amounts of heavy metals, which are highly toxic to both humans and the environment. This book presents a comprehensive overview of heavy metals including their physiochemical properties, toxicity, transfer in the environment, legislation, environmental impacts, and mitigation measures. Written by experts in the field, chapters include scientific research as well as case studies.

Fundamental societal changes resulted from the necessity of people to get organized in mining, transporting, processing, and circulating the heavy metals and their follow-up products, which in consequence resulted in a differentiation of society into diversified professions and even societal strata. Heavy metals are highly demanded technological materials, which drive welfare and progress of the human society, and often play essential metabolic roles. However, their eminent toxicity challenges the field of chemistry, physics, engineering, cleaner production, electronics, metabolomics, botany, biotechnology, and microbiology in an interdisciplinary and cross-sectorial manner. Today, all these scientific disciplines are called to dedicate their efforts in a synergistic way to avoid exposure of heavy metals into the eco- and biosphere, to reliably monitor and quantify heavy metal contamination, and to foster the development of novel strategies to remediate damage caused by heavy metals.