Image credit: Rocket Lab. The Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment, or CAPSTONE, launching aboard Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket from the Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1 on the Mahia Peninsula of New Zealand Tuesday, June 28, 2022.
3D printing, lithium power NASA’s Moon mission
As this edition was going to press, NASA launched its CAPSTONE satellite to the Moon. This is the first step of the Artemis mission to return humans to the Earth’s nearest astronomical neighbour permanently. (And if you have not been watching the alternative history version series of human Moon missions, For All Mankind, you are missing out!) The launch was a first in many ways. It was powered by NASA’s launch partner Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket, a composite made two-stage orbital vehicle fuelled by a bio-propellant, and the smallest rocket to launch a payload (a microwave-sized satellite) beyond Earth’s orbit towards the moon. It was also the first lunar mission to launch from New Zealand, where US-based Rocket Lab has a subsidiary.
Electron is powered, in both first and second stage, by Rocket Lab’s Rutherford engine, made using electron beam powder-bed fusion (PBF-EB) additive manufacturing. Almost all parts of it are 3D printed. Rutherford is the first electric-pump-fed engine to power an orbital class rocket. Power to the pumps comes from lithium-polymer batteries. Some are jettisoned and, like the first stage, will not be recovered, but this just goes to show that there is more need for lithium (and potentially alternative battery elements, depending which way cathode chemistry goes) than to just drive cars on our small blue planet. On which note…
EU aims to cut CO2, but where is EV charging?
After much deliberation, the European Parliament voted on carbon emissions policies as the EU aims towards net zero, effectively tying its industrial and trade policy to climate goals. MEPs adopted a position on revising the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) and the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) which taxes imported goods on the basis of their carbon content. This included phasing out free allowances in ETS sectors by 2032, to much concern and continued warnings from the European steel industry. Separately, MEPs voted to ban sales of new combustion engine vehicles in the EU from 2035. In response, the European automobile manufacturers association ACEA urged the European parliament to adopt the Alternative Fuel Infrastructure Regulation without delay and to match its ambitious targets for the car industry with targets for charging infrastructure for each member state. It also pointed to the need for robust policies for critical raw materials security, which includes supply of battery materials and critical metals such as magnesium.
To be very clear: the automobile industry will fully contribute to the goal of a carbon-neutral Europe in 2050. But the decision of the Council raises significant questions which have not yet been answered, such as how Europe will ensure strategic access to the key raw materials for e-mobility,” stated Oliver Zipse, ACEA President and CEO of BMW.
“If the EU wants to be a pioneer of sustainable mobility, the availability of these materials must be secured. Otherwise, we will be threatened with new dependencies, as other economic regions have already positioned themselves at an early stage,” ACEA President Oliver Zipse said.
Critical raw materials security
Russia’s war in Ukraine, increasingly militarised diplomacy in the South China Sea have put a fire under European and North American efforts to safeguard supplies of critical raw materials. Some, such as magnesium, titanium, rare earths or even chromium are classified as critical precisely because of their disproportionately localised supply.
In June, during the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) Convention in Toronto, the European
Commission and its ten partner countries including Australia, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Sweden, the United Kingdom announced the establishment of the Minerals Security Partnership (MSP). Time will tell how effective this partnership will be, but it is likely to accelerate any viable extraction, processing and recycling of critical metals within partnership countries. In the meantime, Securing America’s Critical Raw Materials Supply Act, targeted at monitoring vulnerable energy supply chains, is starting to make its its way through the US Senate, with a focus on lithium for renewable energy.
In June, US lawmakers added the monitoring of antimony stockpiling into the National Defence Authorisation Act. And the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, will invest $74.6 million across 30 states in geoscience mapping of areas with potential for critical minerals, be they in the ground or in waste, under the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Earth Mapping Resources Initiative (Earth MRI). Other efforts to find alternative US supply include the University of North Dakota research into the potential for recovering rare earth elements from coal.
