Il problema dei motori a magneti e' che i magneti richiedono
terre rare di cui la Cina ha un monopolio relativo:
<
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/421223/chinas-rare-earth-monopoly/>
"China now produces nearly all of the world’s supply of rare
earths, which are crucial for a wide range of technologies,
including hard drives, solar panels, and motors for hybrid
vehicles."
Cioe, nel 2010 la Cina produceva la meta' della quantita'
mondiale di terre rare. E la Cina ha gia' usato questo suo
predominio, mettendo duramente sotto pressione il Giappone,
quindi abbiamo pure il precedente dell'utilizzo delle
esportazioni di terre rare come metodo di pressione politica.
Ovviamente non sarebbe la prima volta, e' gia' accaduto con
altre materie prime, ad esempio il gas ed il petrolio.
E nota a parte, l'Italia che potrebbe accedere al solare con
una tecnologia alternative che non richiede materie prima
rare o di cui e' scarsa, con perfetta idiozia va a puntare tutto
sul fotovoltaico (che trovate elencato sopra, oltre al problema
che neanche produciamo le celle) solo perche' "piace" agli
elettori, che credono a torto che usando tutti i tetti d'Italia
possono entro il 2050 soddisfare la quasi totalita' della domanda
elettrica con il fotovoltaico (anche questo un errore) con costi
pari delle alternative. La vicenda Dolce & Gabbana dovrebbe
invece svegliare le torpire coscienze e capire cosa succede a
scegliere una strada di totale dipendenza verso l'estero.
Questo motore con *statore* di alluminio mi sembra andare nella
direzione di rimpiazzare i vantaggi i vantaggi dei magneti
permentanti con una tecnologia asincrona un 25% piu' efficiente
e leggera.
"Rare earths include 17 elements, such as terbium, which is used
to make green phosphors for flat-panel TVs, lasers, and
high-efficiency fluorescent lamps. Another of these elements,
neodymium, is key to the permanent magnets used to make
high-efficiency electric motors."
Il monopolio cinese non e' assoluto, perche' le terre rare si
trovano anche altrove nel mondo, ma attualmente e' la Cina
che si e' impegnata con le sue societa' minerarire di stato
ed usando una programmazione lungimirante, ad avere stabilito
il maggior numero di miniere al mondo.
Ecco un paragrafo proprio riguardo alla Tesla:
"Alternatives to rare earths exist for some technologies. One
example is the induction motor used by Tesla Motors in its
all-electric Roadster. It uses electromagnets rather than
permanent rare-earth magnets. But such motors are larger and
heavier than ones that use rare-earth magnets. As a rule of thumb,
in small- and mid-sized motors, an electromagnetic coil can be
replaced with a rare-earth permanent magnet of just 10 percent
the size, which has helped make permanent magnet motors the
preferred option for Toyota and other hybrid vehicle makers.
In Tesla’s case, the induction motor technology was worth the
trade-off, giving the car higher maximum power in more conditions,
a top priority for a vehicle that can rocket from zero to
60 mph in 3.7 seconds. “The cost volatility going into the
rare-earth permanent magnets was a concern,” says JB Straubel,
Tesla’s chief technology officer. “We couldn’t have predicted
the geopolitical tensions.”
Un motore a magneti permanenti e' solo il 10% della dimensione
di un motore asincrono convenzionale (quindi se volete mettere
il motore nel cerchione della ruota, ovviamente con lo statore
interno ed il rotore esterno, e' piu' facile che sia a magneti
permanenti). Al sig.Musk non piaceva pero' l'incertezza del
mercato dei magneti permanenti e cosi' ha optato per il motore
asincrono. Anche altri hanno seguito:
"More manufacturers are following Tesla’s lead to shun the
rare-earth materials, although the move means sacrificing space
and adding weight to vehicles. A week after the China dust-up began,
a research team in Japan announced that it had made a hybrid-vehicle
motor free of rare-earth materials, and Hitachi has announced similar
efforts. BMW’s Mini E electric vehicle uses induction motors, and
Tesla is supplying its drive trains to Toyota’s upcoming electric RAV 4.
Given the volatility of rare-earth supplies, and the advantages
induction motors offer in high performance applications, “It makes
sense for car companies to give serious thought to using induction
motors,” says Wally Rippel, senior scientist at AC Propulsion. Rippel
previously worked on induction motor designs at Tesla and GM, where
he helped to develop the seminal EV1."
Gli USA stanno reagendo su vari fronti:
"In the U.S., the Chinese dominance of rare-earth mineral production
has prompted a surge of funding focused on developing permanent
magnets that use less, if any, rare-earth materials, such as nearly
$7 million from the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Energy
(ARPA-E). In one of these projects, University of Nebraska researchers
are working to enhance permanent magnets made with an alloy iron and
cobalt, or FeCo. This class of materials is sold today, but delivers
half or less of the power of the best rare-earth-based magnets. The
Nebraska researchers will focus on ways to dope the structural matrix
of these alloys with traces of other elements, thereby rearranging
their molecular geometry to create stronger, more durable permanent
magnetic materials."
"Working alongside the Nebraska researchers in the same ARPA-E program,
researchers at the University of Delaware are advancing nanocomposites
that use far less of the valuable rare-earth materials, but that have
been shown theoretically to generate magnetic strengths twice as
powerful as today’s best permanent magnets. The lab is mixing
particles, just 20 to 30 nanometers in size, of rare-earth magnetic
materials with a non-rare-earth complement (tin cobalt). Prior efforts
to make this material have been unable to precisely align the
nanoparticles, diminishing their magnetic performance substantially.
Instead of concocting the material in bulk, like mixing batter, the
team is developing a process to control the particles’ alignment by
assembling them in regular arrays."
"GE Global Research, in Niskayuna, New York, is pursuing nanocomposites
similar to those being developed in Delaware, also with ARPA-E funding.
Using methods developed in-house, the project aims to build a new
material through the alignment of nanopowders. “These materials are
intrinsically unstable,” so controlling their assembly is at the
frontier of nanoscale manufacturing processes, says Luana Iorio, a
manager at GE’s High Temperature Alloys and Processing Laboratory,
who leads the research. GE estimates its nanocomposites could deliver
35 percent greater magnetic strength than today’s best permanent
magnets, while using 40 percent of the rare earths, by volume. Within
two years, Iorio hopes, the project will be able to create samples of
the new material a few centimeters in diameter."
Ho citato pesantemente l'articolo perche' non e' archiviabile.