Volkswagen, DieselGate And What If Nazi Ruled The World?

  

  It is not about hard working brilliant engineers and workers at Volkswagen in Germany and all over the world. And it is a rhetorical question. You already live in that world. Let's start with the definition:

Nazi - a member of National Socialist German Workers' Party 

  The fat cats in the boardrooms have let us all down again. The key word here is Nationalism. It was not really about socialism or workers, it was about the control of masses and the grand idea. Idea was simple: that one nation can be better than others and, as we all know, it can take you quite a long way with the stretch of the evil imagination. We live in the world when some people have decided that they are better than others. We will not go as far as discussing Brothers and other "conspiracy theories" today, but let's just have a look at the corporate world. 

  It is all about Nationalism (Your Corporation), Control and Punishment if you are out of line. Living from cheque to cheque is not helping to built up your independence. This is why there is a War on the middle class in the West. Independent people are dangerous to the System by definition. Here comes Debt and slavery to the banks by generations only to pay off the ticket just to get on the ladder of the "American Dream". 

  All major corporate crimes can be committed only when the masses are silent being busy digesting fast food with video games and Facebook "friends". Or deeper: when corporate slavery affects you own perspective from the cubicle so much that you think that it is Not Evil any more.

  This is what happened at Volkswagen. This is what happening with Fracking and GMO. They all affect literally billions of people on our planet. It is a corporate mass murder sanctioned by the corrupt politicians. Now we know about Volkswagen and it is already growing into the DieselGate, when nobody of auto-makers really is in compliance with toxic emissions limits. The next is coming the AutoGate, when ALL cars are emitting deadly pollutions at much higher levels than we all have thought. 

  And we are not talking about the socialism in any cense here, it is just the problem that we do not have capitalism in the West as well. We are not against corporations, but the corrupted HFT version of the wild corporate capitalism now is pushing more and more young people to the nihilism and socialism is on the rise in the West again. Evil minds will get into power driving the desperation again. But we are out of politics and, thanks God, we have the solution now. 

  Let's stop talking and let's start walking. But walking to the Solution - not just ban all the cars, get in the communes again and read with a candle. No, we do not have to do it any more, despite of Fossil Fuel corporate propaganda. Finally technology has made it possible not only to preserve "our way of life", but make it better without sacrificing anything or, what is even more important, anyone.

  If somebody in Power does really want it, we have all technology and solutions available now. If somebody in Power was allowed by the Corporations who paid her ticket there - we have all the money to make it. Just take all costs of all Wars - yes, they all about Control of Energy and Oil means Energy to us even now. Add here all Trillions in tax breaks and subsidies provided to Fossil Fuel Industries. Nuclear will go here as well. Add all billions wasted on Hydrogen - it will be controlled by the same Old Big Oil, we will not even talk about the very low energy efficiency of full Energy cycle of Hydrogen To Wheel today. Add here all medical bills for cancer and other chemical pollution related deceases. It will be enough for a very good and fast start to the race into the post carbon world!
  Invest this money into Electric Cars, Solar and Wind. Put trucks on the natural Gas first and Hybrids later. Move to the real Energy Security with distributed Solar and Wind power generation. Close all coal plants and nuclear as well. Use the Sun: Solar and Wind power costs are dropping like a stones now, why do we have to live still in the stone age in cages provided by Big Oil and Fossils? It was supposed to be over - the stone age, and not due to the lack of stones, we have the technology to make it without burning fossil fuels now.
  Maybe now we have a chance, finally, with all our social media? Do not hold your breath thou. There is a Kill Switch. Once you start talking about the real things, censors are here: you are just getting lost - so far so good, it is only in the social media. And it is not in China or with Putin, it is here on Twitter …
 Snowden is trending with his latest revelations how "They" can take over your iPhone. "They" will take over everything if you allow it! And the last thought on social media: we have multiple choices now, but just check the quality and what kind of message do you get from all those multiple streams. It is great that you can chose, but than again GMO is claiming its victims …
  Why is it so long? Because the time has come. Other people will make the choice for you as usual. We are not talking here about poor asylum seekers or millions of refuges displaced by Wars for Oil. We are talking about you driving Range Rover to the school where your kids are breathing toxic cancerogenic air from thousands of other cars around them. Where is your rage, are you mad as hell for all of them lying to us? At least for your kids? No, don't take guns, do not vote for socialist or even do not stop to drive. Just bring change, demand it, talk about it, donate your RT! Vote with your wallet. When you can buy your electric car. Stop buying all that killing us rubbish. Just do not let "Them" decide for you again and raise 70% toxic emissions standards in order that auto-makers can comply with it!
  And it is not your choice any more, The big pain is coming. Lithium Technology is here to change our world. Elon Musk will not make it all alone. We have to push our society to accept this disruption and stop burning fossil fuels to produce our energy. We have to have our "Manhattan plan" to make it.
  China is rising and it has the military plan to build electric cars as strategic industry. It is great … for China, what about us? Do you know that Lithium Battery was developed in the West? It was commercialised by SONY in 80s and now South Korea is the leading manufacturer with Samsung and LG Chem. But China already controls 75% of Lithium Hydroxide which goes into Tesla batteries and they are moving very fast with their own Megafactories to rival Tesla with its Gigafactory to produce lithium batteries on the mass scale. The pain is coming, you can't stop it. Internal Combustion Engines (ICE) will be dying with Fossil Fuels. It is just law of nature. Electric Cars are better and they will become cheaper as well  very soon. We can make it as a pain of growth, but who will make it?  All these jobs for The Next Industrial rEVolution could be here, not just going again to China. Germany with its brilliant engineers can produce batteries and electric cars and it can happen in every country. But they all need your help to change, what have you done lately?

  

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CNET: Digging for rare earths: The mines where iPhones are born

  

  Jay Greene from CNET has published a great article about the REE, what they are used for and the state of the Rare Earth industry addressing very important environmental concerns.  Modern technology and, particularly, Mobile and New Energy Applications like Wind, Solar and Electric Cars can not be produced without REE. Safe way of production means that the prices will go up and Security of Supply of These Strategic Commodities will be driving investment demand here.

Super Magnets: All About Rare Earth Metals

"After very fast initial Boom and Bust stage of this generational Bull market Rare Earths are coming back on the radar screens now. China will be an importer of REE from 2014 and has just announced the stockpiling of REE with the budget close to 1 billion dollars."

TNR Gold Rare Earth Element projects presentation

CNET:

Digging for rare earths: The mines where iPhones are born

How are these unusual minerals extracted from the ground and why is that process an environmental risk? CNET's Jay Greene explains.

The rare-earth mineral mine in Mountain Pass, Calif., run by Molycorp.

(Credit: Jay Greene/CNET )

MOUNTAIN PASS, Calif. -- About 60 miles southwest of Las Vegas, in a mine some 500 feet deep, the beginnings of an iPhone come to life.

But the sleek, shiny iPhone is far, far removed from the rocks pulled out of this giant hole, which looks like a deep crater on the moon. A very deep crater. The ground is covered with rust-colored boulders, rocks, and pebbles. The walls etched with striations in varying shades of black, are notched, every 75 feet or so, creating steps that only a giant could use to climb out of the pit.

The base of the mine is several football fields wide. Massive yellow excavators pull huge clumps of dirt from the earth, depositing them into equally giant haulers. And on this baking hot July day, when the temperatures approach 100 degrees, a geyser of water is shooting from a truck, in a never-ending bid to tamp down the dust.

From rocks to recycling: The life of an iPhone

Yesterday: We looked at the human toll of creating iPhones, and the activists pushing to improve working conditions.

Inside the rocks from this mine are rare-earth minerals, crucial ingredients for iPhones, as well as wind turbines, hybrid cars, and night-vision goggles. Minerals such as neodymium are used in magnets that make speakers vibrate to create sound. Europium is a phosphor that creates a bright red on an iPhone screen. Cerium gets put into a solvent that workers use to polish devices as they move along the assembly line.

"Your iPhone doesn't work without rare earths in there, " said Mark Smith, chief executive of Molycorp.

What's unique about Molycorp is that it's trying to harvest rare-earth minerals in an environmentally friendly way, or at least as environmentally friendly a way as a mine can manage. The company has come up with a proprietary method that it believes is the answer to the toxic mess that's defined much of the world's rare-earth mining. And if Molycorp executives are correct, they may be modernizing rare-earth mining in a way that could force Chinese competitors to improve the way they operate.

"We started working at trying to do things differently," Smith said during a tour of the mine.

That's important, because in China, which produces more than 90 percent of the world's supply of rare-earth minerals, environmental laws have historically been scant and enforcement lax. The center of rare-earth mining there is Baotou, a city in Inner Mongolia with 2.3 million residents that's become something of a poster child for mining's ecological wreckage.

By some accounts, the smog in Baotou can be dense, the air acrid. But the biggest hazard is an artificial "tailings" lake west of the city, where refineries that process the rare-earth minerals dump their waste. A Daily Mail reporter, who sneaked past guards and climbed sand dunes to reach the rim of the lake, described it as "an apocalyptic sight."

"The lake instantly assaults your senses. Stand on the black crust for just seconds and your eyes water and a powerful, acrid stench fills your lungs," the article read.

A separate report in The New York Times noted that the lake wasn't lined properly when it was built decades ago. As a result, radioactive waste has seeped into the ground. Farmers have complained that their plants can't grow in the region and that their animals have become sick. Villagers near the lake complain of teeth failing out and hair turning prematurely white.

Chinese state media reported that a 2006 study by local authorities showed levels of radioactive thorium in soil near the lake were 36 times higher than other areas of Baotou. Thorium is typically found in the same ore as rare-earth minerals and separated out during processing. Exposure to high levels of thorium can cause lung and pancreatic cancer.

A satellite image of the rare-earth mineral tailings lake in Baotou, China.

(Credit: GeoEye Satellite Imagery )

Molycorp's Smith believes his company can rewrite the way vital rare-earth minerals are mined and processed. Molycorp machines are now pulling some 2,800 tons of fresh ore from the ground in Mountain Pass per day, four days a week. Those rocks are hauled to a massive crushing facility, a warren of tubes and conveyer belts that ultimately lead to a silo where the ore gets pounded into pieces about three-eighths of inch wide.

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Those pebbles then move via conveyer belt to a mill, a long rectangular building, high on a plain overlooking the Mountain Pass site. There, they get mixed with water and dumped into a giant cylinder with large steel balls. The mixture turns into a slurry that moves to a so-called hot floatation facility.

See also: When recycling your iPhone is actually bad for the environment

Molycorp adds chemicals to the mix that, when heated, cling to the rare-earth minerals and rise with the bubbles that float to the top. The company then skims off the rare-earth concentrate.

The remainder, about 92 percent of the entire mix, has no commercial value. In Baotou, that mix, which includes slightly radioactive thorium and uranium and other toxic chemicals, goes into the tailings lake. Because it's still liquid, the waste can leach into groundwater, creating environmental hazards. Molycorp's proprietary process presses the water out of the tailings in order to reuse it. What's left is a paste, to which Molycorp adds cement and then lays out in a lined disposal site.

"One thing you won't see at Mountain Pass is a pond of radioactive waste," Molycorp's Smith said. "No tailings pond, no worries about contaminated groundwater."

(The story continues below. Click on the image to download the infographic.)

(Credit: Mark Hobbs/CNET )

The rare-earth concentrate heads to a separations facility, where acids are added to pull apart the different rare-earth minerals. Eventually, the separate elements are dried, and the powder versions of neodymium, europium, and the rest are bagged up and sold to customers, some of them Apple's partners that make the speakers, the screen, and the vibration unit that comprise an iPhone.

"We are well indoctrinated into that iPhone," Smith said. "We're an important and indispensable part of that iPhone."

You get the sense walking around Mountain Pass with Smith, even in his oh-so-out-of-place business suit and tie, that there's no place he'd rather be. Square-jawed and sporting a crew cut, Smith says he could talk about rare-earth minerals all day. He mentions dinners with his wife, when he points to all the different objects in the restaurant that wouldn't exist without rare-earth minerals (which makes me think Mrs. Smith is an awfully tolerant woman).

Molycorp Chief Executive Mark Smith

(Credit: Jay Greene/CNET )

Smith, a lawyer with a degree in agricultural engineering from Colorado State University, wants to rewrite the global rare-earth mining playbook. He believes Molycorp, which invested $895 million to modernize the mining operations here, could seize as much as a third of the global market for rare-earth minerals when the revamped Mountain Pass facility becomes fully operational next year.

Can Molycorp compete with its Chinese rivals? Jack Lifton, founding principal at the mining research firm Technology Metals Research, notes that China has developed "a technically sophisticated rare-earth processing industry and a strong academic community in the rare-earth chemistry and processing fields." While the Chinese don't elaborate on their costs, Lifton is dismissive about any claims that Molycorp can significantly undermine rivals' costs.

Related stories

• Pay dirt: Why rare earth metals matter to tech (FAQ)
• Rare-earth miner Molycorp acquires alloy maker
• China to reform rare-earth exports after WTO ruling

The Chinese government has also increased efforts to reduce the ecological damage of rare-earth mining. It's instituted quotas and restricted exports of the minerals in recent years, in part because the government has ramped up environmental oversight, though many suspect the move was also intended to drive up prices.

"There are a lot of things that the rare-earth industry should not be proud of over there," Molycorp's Smith said about the environmental mess in China. "But I'll give China credit. They are stepping up their environmental regulation." The Chinese government recently released a report detailing some of those environmental efforts, including new laws focused on water pollution and treatment and plans to enforce them.

There's little doubt the environmental cost of creating an iPhone, as well as those wind turbines, hybrid engines, and the bevy of other technical wonders that use rare-earth minerals, has been immense.

But regulatory pressure, coupled perhaps with the market forces of the new Molycorp mine, could be the start of a cleaner rare-earth mining industry."