Scientists are Mining Metals From an Unusual Source — Plants
August 3, 2021
[url][
https://grist.org/science/phytomining-n ... aysia//url]
Introduction:
(Grist) Malaysia’s Kinabalu Park, which surrounds Mount Kinabalu, the 20th-largest peak in the world, is home to a nickel mine like none other. In lieu of heavy machinery, plumes of sulfur dioxide, or rivers red with runoff, you’ll find four acres of a leafy-green shrub, tended to since 2015 by local villagers. Once or twice per year, they shave off about a foot of growth from the 20-foot-tall plants. Then, they burn that crop to produce an ashy “bio-ore” that is up to 25 percent nickel by weight.
Producing metal by growing plants, or phytomining, has long been tipped as an alternative, environmentally-sustainable way to reshape – if not replace – the mining industry. Of 320,000 recognized plant species, only around 700 are so-called “hyperaccumulators,” like Kinabalu’s P. rufuschaneyi. Over time, they suck the soil dry of metals like nickel, zinc, cobalt, and even gold.
While two-thirds of nickel is used to make stainless steel, the metal is also snapped up by producers of everything from kitchenwares to mobile phones, medical equipment to power generation. Zinc, on the other hand, is essential for churning out paints, rubber, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, plastics, inks, soaps, and batteries. And, as supplies of these hard-to-find metals dry up around the world, demand remains as strong as ever.
The idea of phytomining was first put forth in 1983 by an agronomist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture named Rufus L. Chaney. Other research groups before the Malaysia team have shown that the solar-powered and carbon-neutral metal extraction process works in practice — a key step to winning over mining industry investors, who have insisted on field trials of several acres to show proof of principle. The most recent data out of Kinabalu Park, a UNESCO-listed heritage site located on the island of Borneo, is finally turning industry heads, as they shows the scales have tipped in favor of phytomining’s commercial viability.
“We can now demonstrate that metal farms can produce between 150 to 250 kilograms of nickel per hectare (170 to 280 pounds per acre), annually,” said Antony van der Ent, a senior research fellow at Australia’s University of Queensland whose thesis work spurred the Malaysia trial. At the midpoint of that range, a farmer would net a cool $3,800 per acre of nickel at today’s prices – which, van der Ent added, is “on par with some of the best-performing agricultural crops on fertile soils, while operating costs are similar.”
caltrek comment: future vocabulary word for the day - phytomining.
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