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Sweden claims largest discovery of ‘crucial’ rare-earth elements in Europe

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Sweden claims largest discovery of 'crucial' rare-earth elements in Europe
GLOBALTIMESPAKISTAN

While it could take more than a decade to develop, state-owned Swedish mining company LKAB said Thursday it uncovered Europe s largest known deposit of rare-earth elements, elements that are central components for the energy transition.

Rare-earth elements, along with lithium and cobalt, are essential for the batteries that power electric vehicles and other low-carbon technologies, though most of that is found outside of the Western, developed economies.

LKAB said it found a deposit in the Kiruna area of Sweden, above the Arctic Circle, that contains more than 1 million tons of rare-earth elements.

“This is the largest known deposit of rare-earth elements in our part of the world, and it could become a significant building block for producing the critical raw materials that are absolutely crucial to enable the green transition,” Jan Mostrom, president and CEO of LKAB, said.

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Without sufficient supplies and without mines to extract these minerals, the energy transition would grind to a halt. The European Commission, for example, estimates the bloc will need to see a five-fold increase in rare-earth element supply to meet the expected increase in electric vehicles and wind turbines.

China, however, “completely dominates the market,” LKAB said, and the discovery in Europe will go a long way toward reducing the dependency on any single supplier, a problem the European Union is already working to address by looking for oil and gas suppliers other than Russia.

Dependency was an issue raised Thursday by Fatih Birol, the head of the International Energy Agency. The IEA estimates that the Democratic Republic of Congo currently produces 70% of the world s cobalt, used in lithium-ion batteries, while Australia, Chile and China account for 90% of the total global production of lithium.

There are no rare-earth mines in operation in Europe. LKAB said it s already started some preliminary work to tap the Kiruna deposit, dubbed Per Geijer, but permitting and developmental processes are slow.

“If we look at how other permit processes have worked within our industry, it will be at least 10-15 years before we can actually begin mining and deliver raw materials to the market,” Mostrom said. 

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While it could take more than a decade to develop, state-owned Swedish mining company LKAB said Thursday it uncovered Europe s largest known deposit of rare-earth elements, elements that are central components for the energy transition.

Rare-earth elements, along with lithium and cobalt, are essential for the batteries that power electric vehicles and other low-carbon technologies, though most of that is found outside of the Western, developed economies.

LKAB said it found a deposit in the Kiruna area of Sweden, above the Arctic Circle, that contains more than 1 million tons of rare-earth elements.

“This is the largest known deposit of rare-earth elements in our part of the world, and it could become a significant building block for producing the critical raw materials that are absolutely crucial to enable the green transition,” Jan Mostrom, president and CEO of LKAB, said.

Without sufficient supplies and without mines to extract these minerals, the energy transition would grind to a halt. The European Commission, for example, estimates the bloc will need to see a five-fold increase in rare-earth element supply to meet the expected increase in electric vehicles and wind turbines.

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China, however, “completely dominates the market,” LKAB said, and the discovery in Europe will go a long way toward reducing the dependency on any single supplier, a problem the European Union is already working to address by looking for oil and gas suppliers other than Russia.

Dependency was an issue raised Thursday by Fatih Birol, the head of the International Energy Agency. The IEA estimates that the Democratic Republic of Congo currently produces 70% of the world s cobalt, used in lithium-ion batteries, while Australia, Chile and China account for 90% of the total global production of lithium.

There are no rare-earth mines in operation in Europe. LKAB said it s already started some preliminary work to tap the Kiruna deposit, dubbed Per Geijer, but permitting and developmental processes are slow.

“If we look at how other permit processes have worked within our industry, it will be at least 10-15 years before we can actually begin mining and deliver raw materials to the market,” Mostrom said. 

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China launches Shenzhou-16 mission to Chinese space station

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China launches Shenzhou-16 mission to Chinese space station

 China sent three astronauts to its now fully operational space station as part of crew rotation on Tuesday in the fifth manned mission to the Chinese space outpost since 2021, state media reported.

The spacecraft, Shenzhou-16, or “Divine Vessel”, and its three passengers lifted off atop a Long March-2F rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in the Gobi Desert in northwest China at 9:31 a.m. (0131 GMT).

The astronauts on Shenzhou-16 will replace the three-member crew of the Shenzhou-15, who arrived at the space station late in November.

The station, comprising three modules, was completed at the end of last year after 11 crewed and uncrewed missions since April 2021, beginning with the launch of the first and biggest module – the station’s main living quarters.

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China has already announced plans to expand its permanently inhabited space outpost, with the next module slated to dock with the current T-shaped space station to create a cross-shaped structure.

Leading the Shenzhou-16 mission was Jing Haipeng, 56, a senior spacecraft pilot from China’s first batch of astronaut trainees in the late 1990s. He had travelled to space three times before, including two trips as mission commander.

Jing flew with Zhu Yangzhu and Gui Haichao, both 36 and part of China’s third batch of astronauts. The mission is Zhu’s and Gui’s first spaceflight.

Former military university professor Zhu will serve as spaceflight engineer while Gui, a professor at Beihang University, will serve as the payload specialist on the mission, managing science experiments at the space station.

Beijing is expected to launch one more crewed mission to the orbiting outpost this year.

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Also by the end of 2023, China is due to a launch space telescope the size of a large bus.

Known as Xuntian, or “Surveying the Heavens” in Chinese, the orbital telescope will boast a field of view 350 times wider than that of the Hubble Space Telescope, which was launched 33 years ago.

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WhatsApp rolling out archive feature for businesses on Android

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WhatsApp rolling out archive feature for businesses on Android

 WhatsApp is going to launch a new feature called “status archive” as a new business tool that will help people to share their previous status updates with their customers.

The feature is currently being rolled out to beta testers of WhatsApp Business for Android and will become available to more users in the coming weeks, a media outlet that closely monitors the updates in the messaging app said in its blog.

The users will receive a notification within the Status tab asking them if they want to enable the feature on their WhatsApp accounts.

When this feature is enabled, the status updates will automatically be sent into archives on the users’ device after 24 hours. In addition, people can manage their archive preferences and see it directly from the menu within the Status tab.

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The feature will help businesses to re-share the previous status in an easy way.

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NASA sets coverage for Axiom Mission 2 departure from space station

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NASA sets coverage for Axiom Mission 2 departure from space station

NASA will provide live coverage of the undocking and departure of Axiom Mission 2 (Ax-2) private astronaut mission from the International Space Station before crew returns to Earth.

The four-member multinational astronaut crew is scheduled to undock no earlier than 11:05 a.m. EDT Tuesday, May 30, from the space-facing port of the station’s Harmony module in a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft to begin the journey home and splashdown off the coast of Florida.

NASA will begin live coverage of space station joint operations with Axiom Space and SpaceX, starting with hatch closure preparations at 9 a.m. Tuesday, May 30, on NASA Television, the NASA app, and the agency’s website.

Mission teams will monitor weather at the possible splashdown sites prior to undocking to ensure conditions are acceptable for a safe recovery of the spacecraft and Ax-2 astronauts.

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Ax-2 Commander Peggy Whitson, Pilot John Shoffner, and Mission Specialists Ali Alqarni and Rayyanah Barnawi, both representing the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, will complete approximately nine days in space at the conclusion of their mission. Their SpaceX Dragon will return to Earth with more than 300 pounds of cargo, including NASA hardware and data from over 20 different experiments.

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