Though the demand for cobalt,
tantalum and rare earth metals will continue to increase, a mining consultancy
group warns that there is a risk of supply disruptions. China, which refines
most of the world’s cobalt, could restrict exports, leading to greater price
volatility and increased risk of supply disruptions.
Why there is such great need of that metal? The answer is
the widely application of it and its unique place in our life. The main
application of cobalt is as the metal in alloys, batteries, catalysis, pigments
and coloring. Approximately
3.6 g of cobalt is used in almost every single mobile phone battery and the
penetration of mobile phones, especially in Africa and Asia is expected to
continue to increase driving cobalt demand.
The cobalt demand is also strongly
drove by Electric vehicles and electric bicycles ,as approximately 4 kg of
cobalt would be required for a hybrid electric vehicle battery and 6 kg for a
fully electric vehicle. With between 12- and 13-million hybrid electric
vehicles expected to be on the road by 2020, this would necessitate between 20
000 t and 30 000 t of cobalt, said Smith. Increased manufacture of electric
bicycles and continued demand for aircraft would add further upward pressure on
the metal.
The 2008/9 recession caused a
reduction in the demand for electronics which had a knock-on effect on
tantalum, however if we assume a conservative steady growth rate of 4% in
coming years the demand will be perfectly balanced. Growth above 4% will result
in a supply shortage as early as 2014. Consequently we believe that prices
should ultimately move to reflect this deficit.
Considering all the unexplored
rare earth (metals) then we should pay much attention to the exploration of it,
which means that we should make full use of the metal crusher in order to
maximize the use of cobalt .The high efficient metal crusher can
crush metal like paint bucket, tin cans, scrap metal of professional configure
the device and help
the cobalt supplier a lot to explore it
