and it's investor day today Tesla declared that it would develop a permanent magnet electric vehicle
engine that contained no rare earth materials in EV Supply chains Rare Earth elements are a source
of friction since they can be difficult to obtain and because China is where the vast majority of
the world's output is obtained or processed so how will Tesla make this happen what is Tesla's
mystery magnet then let's find out hello everyone welcome back to Elon Musk Evolution where we bring
you the most recent news about Elon Musk and his multi-billion dollar companies space news and the
latest science and technology but before we begin make sure you subscribe to our Channel and click
the Bell icon so you don't miss any of our amazing videos on March 1 Tesla held its annual investor
day the event started with a long in-depth speech on energy and the environment before
moving into a series of somewhat predictable announcements and claims and then almost out
of nowhere Colin Campbell Tesla's director of powertrain engineering revealed we have designed
our next Drive Unit which uses a permanent magnet motor to not use any Rare Earth elements at all
the majority of permanent magnetism experts were wary and confused by this shocking Revelation the
issue here is physics which not even Tesla can change likewise ping Liu a professor at
the University of Texas in Arlington questioned other scientists at a recent magnetics conference
what they thought of Tesla's remark he claims that no one fully comprehends this
the technical expertise of Tesla should never be disregarded we're still waiting for that 35
000 model 3 for example but on the other hand the company and in particular its CEO has a
history of making sporadic dramatic statements that don't materialize physics is the issue in
this situation which even Tesla cannot change when some of the atoms in a crystal are forced to have
their electron spins point in the same direction permanent magnetism develops in those materials
the magnetism is greater the more of these aligned spins there are the best atoms for this purpose
are those that have a swarm of unpaired electrons in what are referred to as 3D orbitals surrounding
the nucleus tops are Cobalt with three and iron which has four unpaired third order electrons
super strong magnets can't be created with just 3D electrons though the rare earth metals neodymium
samarium and dysprosium are among those that can be added to the crystalline lattice to
significantly increase magnetic strength as scientists discovered decades ago the
magnetic moments of the atoms are essentially encouraged to cling to the precise directions
in the crystal lattice by these four F electrons enhancing a property of the crystalline lattice
known as magnetic anisotropy that can then be used to generate High coercivity which is
a crucial characteristic that enables a permanent magnet to maintain its magnetic field likewise by
coordinating and maintaining the spin alignment of the 3D electrons in the lattice the unpaired
4f electrons can increase the Crystal's magnetic properties through a number of intricate physical
mechanisms in high performance applications such as Motors smartphones loudspeakers and
wind turbine generators a permanent magnet based on the compound neodymium iron and
boron has dominated since the 1980s more than 90 percent of the permanent magnets used in vehicle
traction Motors in 2019 were ndfeb according to a survey by London's raw skill Information Services
what sort of permanent magnets will Tesla use next if not Rare Earth ones it was decided upon
by all experts who were ready to speculate ferrite magnets only two non-rare Earth permanent magnets
that have been developed to this point ferrites and an additional variety known as alnaco are
being produced on a big scale six Specialists who were contracted by the IEEE Spectrum insisted that
alnaco will not be used by Tesla in addition to being weak these magnets account for fewer
than two percent of the market for permanent magnets due to the unstable Global Cobalt Supply
ferrite magnets which are inexpensive and make up approximately 30 percent of the permanent
magnet industry by sales are based on a type of iron oxide however they are very fragile
their main function is to hold refrigerator doors closed the maximal energy product of a permanent
magnet expressed in mega Goss oversteads is a crucial performance parameter it displays a
magnet's coercivity as well as its strength this value typically ranges between 35 and 40 megagos
overstads for the type of boron that is frequently utilized in car traction Motors it is close to
four for the best ferrite magnets according to Daniel Salazar Jaramillo a magnetics researcher
at The Basque Center for materials applications and nanostructures in Spain even if you get the
best performance ferrite magnet you will have performance about 5 to 10 times below neodymium
iron boron thus a synchronous motor based on ferrite magnets will be significantly larger and
heavier significantly weaker or some combination of the two as opposed to a motor constructed using
Boron magnets indeed there are a large number of alternative permanent magnets that either don't
use Rare Earth elements at all or only use small amounts of them however none of these have had any
influence outside of the lab High field strength high coercivity resistance to high temperatures
good mechanical strength ease of manufacture and lack of dependence on materials that are scarce
poisonous or Troublesome for other reasons are among the qualities required for a commercially
viable permanent magnet today's contenders all fall short of checking off at least one of these
items however some researchers assert that if we wait a few more years one or two of these may very
possibly succeed iron nitrite is one of the most promising materials after earlier work at Hitachi
Jean ping Wang developed the technique at the University of Minnesota in the early 2000s with
funding from arpa E and is now commercializing it under the name nyron magnetics according
to Andy Blackburn Executive Vice President of nairon the business plans to release its first
product in the latter half of 2024. according to Blackburn it will be a permanent magnet Within an
energy product above 10 mega Goss overstads and he expects it to find use among other things in
sensors and loudspeakers if it is successful it will be the first brand new commercial permanent
magnet since ndfeb which was commercialized 40 years ago as well as the first non-rare Earth
permanent magnet since strontium ferrite the best ferrite type which was commercialized 60 years ago
according to Blackburn niron's initial product will be followed in 2025 by a magnet with an
energy output more than 30 mgoe he makes a fairly audacious prediction in light of this it'll have
as good or better flux than neodymium better than ndfeb which allowed the coercivity of a ferrite
and the temperature coefficients of samarium cobalt the magnet would be ideal for use in the
traction Motors of electric cars if it could actually combine all three qualities a big if
Blackburn says there will be more to come he claims that because of advances in nanoscale
engineering it is now possible to produce materials that were unfeasible to produce 20
years ago what are the implications if Tesla's Next Generation Motors are rare Earths free
the global OEM internal combustion engine automotive industry is the main driver of
demand for Rare Earth permanent magnets followed by or paralleled by the direct drive wind turbine
electricity generation industry at the moment the global OEM EV industry and the global Military
industry Tesla is not the driver of the global demand for rare Earths Tesla is a prime example
even if only as a symbol not the thing itself exactly the issue is the growing usage albeit
in very small amounts of technological metals that are expensively rare but are necessary for
downsizing which allows for widespread consumer use of information and entertainment Technologies
nowadays power windows power seats windshield wiper motors yes this is a safety essential
audio loudspeakers and power steering are the main convenience and style accessories found
in cars that use Rare Earth permanent magnets which have enabled the shrinking of electric
motors they are not necessary now and never have been for use in Drive motors for vehicle
powertrains when compared to using AC Motors the usage of rare earth permanent magnet motors
in drivetrains boosts powertrain efficiency while reducing vehicle weight the main goal of adopting
Rare Earth permanent magnet Drive Motors is to enhance range and both variables do this
after the OEM ice car sector direct drive wind turbine generators are the main demand drivers
for Rare Earth permanent magnet motors in this case generators accounting for nearly a third
of the manufacturing of these enormous machines due to scale the as of yet small OEM EV business
is catching up between 5 and 10 times as much Rare Earth permanent magnet material is needed
to make an ordinary EV employing Rare Earth permanent magnet Drive Motors as today's Teslas
therefore EVS will quadruple the current demand for Rare Earth permanent magnets by the worldwide
OEM automobile industry if and when the EV Market segment reaches 10 percent of the ice segment and
if all EVS use Rare Earth permanent magnet Drive Motors everyone can see why the capacity of the
Chinese Rare Earth permanent magnet manufacturing sector will travel by 2025. after 2025 finding
non-chinese or possibly even Chinese sources of rare earth permanent magnets will be difficult
for Teslas and any other automobile or truck manufactured outside of China makers of small
accessory Motors and loudspeakers as well as wind turbine generator manufacturers will all do so
today China is the exclusive producer of rare Earth's Rare Earth permanent magnets and rare
earth permanent magnet motors without a targeted and well-funded non-chinese rare earth permanent
magnet production Industrial program trade de globalization just serves to reinforce China's
Monopoly in this sector simply put Elon Musk is more smart at interpreting the signs than his
colleagues in Stuttgart and Detroit iron nitrides powerful magnets without the Rare Earth elements
fortunately there are multiple methods for creating magnets and it may soon be able to
create permanent magnets that are just as powerful as neodymium magnets without using any rare earth
metals in truth all that is required to create them is iron and nitrogen along with a knowledge
of crystal structure and a little technical creativity what is a permanent magnet in the first
place there isn't a clear answer that doesn't involve some hand waving to this question like
there are to many other straightforward inquiries about nature even physicists reach a point where
they can only say we just don't know but that doesn't mean that magnetism is completely unknown
in fact what is known about magnetism is fairly simple and it actually AIDS in understanding how
both rare earth magnets and their substitutes function in brief any charged particle like
an electron has what is known as an intrinsic Magnetic Moment which makes them act like tiny
magnets these magnetic moments impact electron shell atoms cancel each other out because each
pair of electrons has moments pointing in opposing directions the magnetic moments cannot be canceled
out in atoms with unpaired electrons in their outer shells hence these elements are magnetic
these substances often originate from two distinct regions of the periodic table the D-Block Metals
which include Cobalt nickel and iron and the f-block actinides lanthanides which include
rare earth metals like samarium neodymium and prasio-dimium however a magnet is more
complicated than just the elements that make it up demonstrated by the periodic table the
goal of magnetism is to align and align all of those intrinsic magnetic moments the atoms of
a magnetic element must organize themselves such that their magnetic moments are all facing in the
same direction just as the electrons in an atom of that element must avoid colliding with one another
this is referred to as having a high magnetic anisotropy and is one of the properties of
powerful magnets the strength of rare earth magnets is mostly a result of the extremely
high magnetic anisotropy of rare earth metals like neodymium however rare earth metals don't actually
make very good magnets on their own at least not in a practical sense the reason for this
is that they have a comparatively low Curie point or the temperature at which a substance ceases to
be magnetic a pure Bar of neodymium wouldn't be a magnet at all at ambient temperature in
fact it wouldn't have any magnetic characteristics unless it was refrigerated below 20K to get around
this ferromagnetic materials are combined with rare earth metals to create Alloys that have a
strong magnetic coercivity and a respectable Curie Point Curie temperatures for the most
popular Rare Earth magnet alloy an amalgam of iron neodymium and Boron range from 300 to 400 degrees
Celsius depending on the precise composition of the constituent elements the power of crystals
it's necessary to become familiar with the principles of crystallography before diving deeper
into the magnetic Rabbit Hole the vocabulary and nomenclature used in this subject are confounding
since they appear to be identical to the notation used for conventional chemical formulas yet are
obviously not it is a bewilderingly complex subject there isn't enough room here to go
into detail about crystallography but it would be necessary to fully comprehend how neodymium is
added to iron to create powerful permanent magnets and how it is feasible to create powerful magnets
without using any Rare Earth elements how to make a magnet iron nitride magnets are similar to most
scientific breakthroughs in that there is a long road from the lab to a useful commercial product
many of the most recent developments in Iron nitride permanent magnets have originated in Jan
Peng Wang's group at the University of Minnesota's Department of electrical and computer engineering
there four alternative approaches to the synthesis of bulk iron nitride magnet
material have been established some of which have some potential for use in commercial settings
the initial processes for producing iron nitride magnet required a high temperature process with
a quick cooling of the nitrited sample which doesn't scale up well for industrial production
ion implantation was one of the initial attempts to circumvent this and semiconductor production
this method is frequently used to dope silicone Wafers it involves accelerating ions in a vacuum
with a strong electric field before slamming them onto a Target substrate pure iron foils 500
nanometer thick installed on a silicone substrate are irradiated with atomic nitrogen ions to create
iron nitride magnets the implanted nitrogen is then activated by a series of annealing procedures
which create a thermal strain in the material and confine the nitrogen inside the foil's crystal
structure to provide the appropriate Distortion by stacking the foil into layers and fusing them
together to form a single structure it is possible to create practical magnets foils of iron nitride
magnet produced in this manner exhibit hard magnetic Behavior iron oxide nanoparticles can be
used as the starting material for low temperature nitridation this technique uses ammonia gas
to treat the particles and introduce nitrogen into the crystal structure in a planetary ball
mill iron oxide and ammonium nitrate can also be combined after a few days of grinding at 600 RPM
the stainless steel balls break down the nitrate to create Elemental nitrogen which diffuses into
the iron nanoparticles after being magnetically separated the resultant iron nitrite magnet can
be shaped into solid forms this approach appears to be easily expandable into an industrial process
it is also possible to nitride iron foils and wires at high temperatures in this process ribbons
made of an iron copper Boron alloy are heated to 550 degrees Celsius for 28 hours then quickly
treated at 700 degrees Celsius and then quenched in ice cold water this drained wire method in
which high Purity iron is melted in a crucible with urea is a variation on this technique the
iron and nitrogen from the urea that is breaking down disperse into one another as the mixture is
heated and quenched before being hammered flat and sliced into strips in order to lengthen the
crystal structure and trap the dispersed nitrogen the strips are placed into a straining mechanism
and stretched into an annealing process iron nitrides may have uses beyond the creation
of powerful permanent magnets doping iron nitride magnet with substances like carbon oxygen or Boron
may also make it feasible to create soft magnetics which are materials with lower coercivity and are
useful for parts like the cores of Transformers and inductors or the read write heads of magnetic
media it is more difficult to magnetize these crystals permanently while retaining High
saturation magnetization because these dopants lessen the magnetic anisotropy of the crystal
structure so-called clean Earth magnets have a lot of potential and Elon Musk will take advantage of
this as usual and that ends today's episode what do you think of this episode please subscribe
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