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Market Review: MH-Ni Battery and Lithium Battery in China

1. Ordinary Civil-Used MH-Ni Battery and Hg- Free Alkali- Manganese Battery

The high profit of MH-Ni battery, during the early period of its development, attracted over 100 companies to launch into the developing and production of MH-Ni battery, which resulted severe market competition. By far most of the production lines are eliminated from market due to its inadequate capital, technology and equipment. Only a few companies with large scale, complete production line and strong technique ability survive such as listing companies of Sichuan Changhong , Zhejiang Zhongda Stock Company, TCL and Shan- shan Corporation. However,the ordinary MH-Ni battery market still faces the possible problem of over supply. It is reported that the production capacity of only Chinese listing companies nearly reach to the total one of Japan.

2. MH-Ni Power Battery

The new MH-Ni.power battery will has huge market potential. Electric bicycle is the largest application of MH-Ni power battery, in which market needs Ni-H battery at least 600 million units in 2000, but the total output is only 300 million units. According to the investigation of China Bicycle Society, Chinese electric bicycle market has a potential capacity over 4 million, and therefore demands MH-Nl power battery at least 4 million units except lead-acid cell. China by far has no company able to commercially produce MH-Ni power battery used for electric bicycle.Rare Earth Hi-tech and Chunlan Corporation are preparing to enter this market.

3. Lithium Ion Battery

Conference

    The 4th International Rare Earth Seminar was held on June 16~18, 2001 in Beijing. Mr. Bi qun, director of Chinese Rare Earth Society, took as the chairman of the meeting. Mr. Wenkaiyuan, director of National Rare Earth Office, reviewed the production, consumption and export of rare earth in China in 2000. He also stressed the importance of science and "technology in future Chinese rare earth industry and answered questions about foreign investment in Chinese rare earth line. Eight experts including professor Yan chunhua from Beijing University and Dr. Mien from Australia were I invited delivering speeches at the meeting. The seminar receive 65 papers involving resource, analysis, metallurgy and environment protection, etc., and mostly are on new rare earth material. Rare earth application in agriculture and medical was another hot point in the meeting ( please 1 contact to the editor for more details).

    The 5th Sino-Korea New Material Seminar, organized by the Korea'-Sina New Material Cooperation Center and the Korea Academy of Science and Technology, was held in South Korea in June 11~ 16, 2001. Participants exchange questions on three topics: rare earth, transportation materials, electronics and semiconductor.

Company News

    It is reported that Beacon Paint, a listing company decided to purchase 3A, 4/3A MH-Ni battery production lines from Tianjing Peace Gulf Power Group Corp. Communication Battery Subsidiary for the payment amounts to 141 million Yuan RMB in cash, 10% higher than the assets evaluation value.

    Tianjing Bluesky Sanyo Power Corp. recently announced that the company has finished the t adjustment of its full automatic MH-Ni battery production line in Tanjing Hi-Tech Park and will put into production. The company has gotten sales income of nearly 100 million Yuan RMB since its establishment in 1999.

    Jiangxi Guixi Fertilizer Company Ltd. , basing on a great of market investigation and test, put out a new composite fertilizer which is much adaptable to the national soil and crops. The composite fertilizer can improve crops' absorptivity to NPK by 17%. Having employed the fertilizer, the turnout of food crops and cash crops can be increased by 8% and 10% respectively.

    Jiangsu Xinwei Rare Earth Corporation recently announced the finishing of its second-stage technical reformation engineering of the separation production lines of ion-sorption mineral. More than 300 persons from home and abroad participated the finishing ceremony held on June 28, 2001. Last year the company invested 85 million Yuan RMB to setup a separation line of 6000 ton of rare earth chloride in the first stage engineering. The second-stage engineering costs 150 million Yuan RMB. The factory covers an area of 2500 square meter, and 10 separation lines with 1830 grade cells and can annually separate 3000 ton of ion sorption mineral. The company, therefore, has two separation systems and is able to full separate 15 individual elements. Purity of terbium, dysprosium, samarium, europium, gadolinium, thulium , erbium, holmium, lutetium and yttrium compound are available from 99. 9% ~ 99. 999% respectively, and purity of lanthanum, cerium, praseodymium and neodymium compound can vary from 99. 5% ~ 99. 999% .The company also imported advanced analytical instrument such as JY-ICP and laser granularity meter. Jiangsu Xinwei Rare Earth Corporation is the first rare earth listing company in Hong Kong stock exchange in the name of China Rare Earth Holdings Ltd. Its sales in the first half to June 30 is 333. 05 mln hkd, and net profit is HK $ 78.62 rose 38 per cent from a year earlier.

    Fujian Changting Golden Dragon Company Ltd. decided to invest 7. 742 million Yuan RMB to expand 10 production lines to treat 2000 ton of middle yttrium and europium-rich rare earth oxide per year and produce 1585 ton of products. Upon the completion of expansion, the company expects to increase profit by 1. 264 million Yuan RMB. The company succeed in the separation of 5 individual rare earth oxide and 3 rare earth concentrate last year.

    Nippon Epson Company recently transferred all its Factory of Magnetic Devices to Shanghai to establish a large scale production base of magnetic devices. This action aim at meeting the increasing demand to magnetic devices of computer, appliance and camera. The establishment of Epson magnetic device base can lower company's cost by 15%. Annual output of sintering NdFeB magnet will be increased to more than 400 ton;

World Watch

    SUR AMERICAN GOLD CORP -high grade rare earth mineralization confirmed Sur American Gold corp. has received its high grade encouraging sampling results during follow-up detailed kilometers. Channel sampling was conducted over a strike length of 750 meters at the northeastern rare earth zone which is one of 4 known zones containing potentially economic rare earth mineralization found to date at the Texas Creek Project. The mineralization is believed to occur as monazite-cerium-lanthanum-neodymiuni- thorium-yttrium phosphate mineral, which , world- wide is a common source of rare earth metals.

    The weighted average grade of all the channel samples was 1. 48% REO and includes a higher grade central zone of 450 metres grading 1.7% REO. Of particular importance is the discovery of very significant concentrations of yttrium (average 0. 21% Y2O3) and europium which are used T as phosphors which'produce bright colors in television and computer screens. Sur American Gold corp. has acquired a 100% interest in the Texas creek rare earth prospect. The Texas Creek deposits also contain significant concentrations of niobium

Research Report

    Low temperature battery

    A nitrogen battery specially used in low temperature below 40ˇăC was developed by the Open Laboratory of Rare Earth Chemistry and Physics in Changchun Appliation Research Institute of The Chinese Academy of Science in May 2001. And these AA type and D-type batteries were prepared by a company in Shenzhen using new MH-Ni battery low-temperature anode and cathode materials which developed by the laboratory. In the test experiment, AA-type battery is firstly charged at room temperature and placed under -40~C for 8 hours. Then it begins discharging by 0. 2 in the low temperature environment (-40C) , the battery capacity at this temperature is over 50 percent of the one at room temperature completely meeting the requirement of use. In comparison , ordinary MH-Ni battery in the same condition can not be used because its capacity is only 10 percent of that at room temperature. The performance of D-type battery in low temperature is being tested. Reactions of Rare Earth Acetate Hydrates in Glycols at High Temperatures

    A Japanese research team studied the reaction of rare earth acetate hydrate in ethylene glycol at 300 ˇăC .It yielded two novel crystalline products ,one from La-Gd and the other from Tb-Lu and Y. The presence of both acetate groups and ethylene glycol moieties were suggested from the IR and NMR spectra of these products, and it was con- cluded that these products are ethylene glycol complexes of rare earth acetate (hydroxide) oxide. On the other hand, the reaction of rare earth acetate hydrate in 1, 3-propanediol and 1, 4-butanediol yielded rare earth diacetate hydroxide, two morphs of rare earth acetate oxide and rare earth acetate dihydroxide , depending on the ionic size of rare earth element, but the glycol complexes were not formed. In all cases, acetate groups were not com- pletely eliminated from the coordination sites of the rare earth element by the reaction in glycols. The reaction in ethylene glycol could liberate the acetate groups more easily than other glycols because of high coordination ability of ethylene glycol. CeO2-ZrO2 Solid Solution Promoters Modified by NdA research team from University of Science and Technology of China studied an extetnal layer containing Nd3+ to inhibit the sintering of the nanosized CeO2-ZrO2 solid solution. During calcinations of this kind of double layer materials at 500 ~ 850ˇăC, part of the Nd3+ diffuses into the lattice of CeO2-ZrO2 and the rest remains on the external surface of the nanosized CeO2-ZrO2. Then the segregation of Nd3+ on the surface is resulted. It may prevent from moving of the crystal bound and growing up of the crystal grain, thereby alleviate the sintering of the nanosized CeO2-ZrO2 particles and improve the catalytic performance of the catalysts containing this kind of promoters. Two methods were used to dope the ions of Nd3+ into the CeO2-ZrO2 solid solution. For the first route , the ultrafine CeO2-ZrO2 was impregnated with neodymium nitrate and neodymium-zirconium nitrate sol to form the protection layer, Nd2O3 and Ndo.1Zro.902, respectively. For the second route, the homogeneous ultrafine solid solution of CeO.65 Zro. 25Ndo.1 O2 was prepared by the modified sol-gel method. The surface area and oxygen storage capacity of all the samples at 200ˇăC was measured , and some samples were characterized by XRD and H2- TPR. It was showed that the samples which were modified by the first route possess higher ability to resist the sinteting than those modified by the second one, and the optimum Nd content is 7%. The TWCs (three-way catalysts) containing low content of precious metals (Pt , Pd and Rh ) were also prepared. The supports were prepared by mixing Y- Al.2O3 with the CeO2-ZrO2 solid solutions or with the modified CeO2-ZrO2 containing Nd3+ .It was showed that the light-off temperatures of all the fresh TWCs containing (Ce-Zr-Nd) O2 reduced by 20 ~ 30ˇăC than those of the TWCs with the unmodified supports. Howerver, the improvement of the light-off temperatures is not obvious for the aged TWCs (calcined at 850ˇăC for 2 h) with modified supports containing Nd3+.

Price

July 2001 China RE Products       FOB Price       July 2001 China RE Products       FOB Price

La Metal       99% min       5. 4 US $ /kg       La Oxide       99% min       2740 US $ /kg

Ce Metal       99% min       6. 8 US $ /kg       Ce Oxide       99% min       3310 US $ /kg

Nd Metal       99% min       11 US $ /kg       Nd Oxide       99% min       7100 US $ /kg

Pr Metal.       99%' min       8.8 US $ /kg        Pr Oxide       99% min       5100 US $ /kg

Sro Metal       99% min       20. 0 US $ /kg       Sro Oxide       99% min       8625 US $ /kg

Y Metal       99 %.min      57 US $ /kg       Dy Oxide       99% min       25000 US $ /kg

Dy Metal       99% min       44 US $ /kg       RE Chloride       1125 US $ /kg

Eu Metal       99% min       1072 US $ /kg       RE Carbonate       1020 US $ /kg

Tb Metal       99% min       320 US $ /kg        La:.rich Mischmetal       4. 6 US $ /kg

RE Polishing Powder (H-500)       5.6 US$ /kg       Ce-rich Mischmetal       4. 8 US $ /kg

Low-Zn & Low-Mg Mischmetal       5. 8 US $ /kg

CREIC NEWS VOL 7 NO 4.2001
CN15-1147/TF
PUBLISHED BIMONTHLY

CHIEF EDITOR: Chunsun Wang

CONSULTANTS:

Prof. Kaiyuan Wen: Director, China Rare Earth Office
Prof. Caifeng Wang : CEO, China Rare Earth Office
Prof. Jiaqi Xiong: Metallurgist &. Economist

CREIC NEWS VOL 6 NO 5,2000
CN15-1147/TF
PUBLISHED BIMONTHLY

DIRECTOR,CHIEF EDITOR
JUNXI YAN
EDITOR:JIANCHUN ZHAO

CONSULTANTS:
Prof. Kaiyuan Wen: Director, China Rare Earth Office
Prof. Feng Hong: CEO, China Rare Earth Office
Prof. Jiaqi Xiong: Metallurgist & Economist
Prof. Hui Luo: Chemist
Prof. Jufeng Qiu: Materials Physicist

COPYRIGHT: The information carried on CREI Newsletter is exclusive and may be cited in other publications with the indication of the source of the information. Other action of citation is illegal without the written permission of the chief editor.