The Elements of Power: Gadgets, Guns, and the Struggle for a Sustainable Future in the Rare Metal Age

The author's stated goals were met! This book opened my eyes to why we need to care about this hidden world of rare metals! It is well written and the narrative compelling . Abraham makes this information interesting and accessible through personal stories of his travels and the people he meets. Raised my awareness of my dependence on these rare metals! Hope this book starts a broader conversation about our dependence on these metals and impact of their uses on our world!

How does one rate a book on a linear scale when so many complexities contribute to one's reading experience? The writing here is a bit choppy, the organisation could perhaps be improved, but the material covered in the book makes for an interesting story. Probably it's a 3.5 rather than a 4. However, I certainly enjoyed reading the book which delves into past, current and possible future uses of the rare earths and rare earth metals as well as what they are, where they come from and the conceivable havoc that could result from supply interruptions. One should probably be aware of the crucial uses of these materials in our modern technological age; however, I'm not losing much sleep. Compared to the potential catastrophes or disruptions resulting from wandering nuclear fuel, climate change or other looming unknowns, short supplies of rare earths or metals seem pretty small potatoes. Still this area is one that knowledgeable citizens should know about and this book is a good read.

Quick Review here of David S. Abraham “The Elements of Power!” This is a must-read book for those interested in the “elements” and side-affects of those “rare-earth” compounds that not only drive our modern digital/electronic age, “Green Technologies” and to a very large extent the “National Security” component of modern nations military's! It is a very well researched and thoroughly “documented” work, with one short-fall in that it does not contain an overall map of were all the rare-earth compounds come from across the globe. This is most likely due to as author states on page-16 of “hard-copy” version; “When companies can overcome those hurdles and procure rare metals, their material enters a channel of small trading shops where secrecy reigns and reliable delivery is prized…. Traders profit comes not only from the metals they peddle but also from their monopoly of information. There are profits in obscurity.” This is kind of like in the US State of Alabama, supposedly IAW a veteran whom looked into this, particularly Lower Alabama, where “titanium, silica, aluminum” are mined, apparently in “dredge” ponds, etc.. and the US EPA has supposedly sub-contracted the “environmental” oversight to the Alabama Dept. Environmental Management (ADEM), which in turn has farmed it out to the Alabama Home Builders Association, and it is exceedingly difficult per ADEM or other Alabama web-sites to ascertain what is in fact being mined or dredged by not only whom, but where! (see attached “Capture The Elements of Power.JPG”) It is also odd, for example, that Airbus, AUSTAL, and Thyssen-Krupp Steel, etc…set up shop this location- Mobile, AL, and even in Mississippi, given apparently the use of “titanium” etc… per the author, David S Abraham, in “aircraft” and ship/steel manufacturing….????In Chapter VIII “War Effort-Hard and Smart Metals” the author makes the point that going back to antiquity “a country’s ability to harvest the power of the periodic table has translated directly to the success of its military…” as he states on page-157! On pages 160-161 the author then describes how during World War I the Germans needed “molybdenum” and bought a mine in the US State of Colorado “planning to use American resources against the United States!” Luckily, “the plan never materialized” IAW the author on page-161. Sadly, this is not only example of this the author utilizes. On pages 163-165, the author “highlights” the importance of the element “germanium” which IAW the author on page-165 “is at the heart of thermal-imaging” systems… in aircraft, ships and tanks as well as weapons sights mounted onto rifles…” Furthermore, on page-165 the author asserts “although the U.S. military is reducing its use of germanium in thermal imaging equipment as its wars end, a potential conflict is spurring new demand.” IAW the author, on page-165 “rising tensions between China and its neighbors, most notably, Japan, over territorial ambitions in the South China Sea, are currently leading the demand for germanium.” A very powerful point, on the importance of these metal’s/elements!As far as Green Technology is concerned, on page-137 the author states “Green applications are far more than just wind turbines and solar panels; they are energy-efficient cars, lights and even elevators.” In Chapter VII- “Environmental Needs-Rare Metals Are Green” the author provides good examples of cost-metrics for various industries vs. the cost of using or not using rare earth metals. For example, on page-146 the author states “The consultancy McKinsey notes that with gasoline prices at about $3.50 a gallon, car companies that use batteries at prices below about $250 per kWh could produce electric vehicles competitively.” Clearly, taking about price points for bust or boom. And if boom, the author notes that the demand for “lithium” etc.. required in car batteries will also dramatically increase. Ergo, the author states on page-135, “And as abhorrent as this may sound to some environmentalists, green goals require increased mining and more processing of rare metals.” (Another good example is on page-150: “one may not think much about the power consumption of an elevator, but in the buildings that have them, the elevator uses 5 percent of the structures total energy use. Install a rare earth magnet motor in an elevator and it reduces energy use by half or more.”)Environmentally, speaking the author makes the point on page-180 “Cohen tells me that ten thousand to twenty thousand streams in the United States are now lifeless because companies failed to take precautions to prevent or remediate acid mine drainage.” Acid’s and other caustic chemicals of various sorts are an integral part of “separating” rare-earth elements from other compounds and or elements, like “copper” per the author!On a final note, the author makes a great point on education. The US for example is critically short of “material-scientists” and or engineers, whom are need to not only secure current advances in technology but the future as well. Additionally, the author makes a point, when talking “supply-chains,” that companies, often do not even know their own supply chain of rare earth elements due to things like sub-contracting out sub-components of major products….! This is per the author, highly problematic, and the US Military, where one major weapon system may cost billions, but contains in fact- thousands of sub-components that may have been sub-contracted out by the major supplier….to other smaller suppliers! IAW the author, it would take the US Military years to sort this out for all its weapons systems….! Perhaps, a workable solution, is when Congress grants the award of a contract for a major weapons system, the original “contractor” should be responsible for most all that weapons systems construction and/or sub-components in and of itself?????Conclusion: This is a highly informative work that all interested in “Geo-politics,” technology and as well as “national-security” should read- in addition to "Prisoners of Geography- Ten Maps That Explain Everything About The World" by Tim Marshall (at Amazon.com: https://www.amazon.com/Prisoners-Geography-Explain-Everything-Politics/dp/1501121472/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1541921050&sr=8-1&keywords=prisoners+of+geography) as sort of tie together!

I’ve got the paperback, which is 230 pages, not including footnotes or index. It’s well written. This is the third book I’ve read on rare metals/earths. The first one, The Rare Metals War, focused on the geopolitical aspects of rare metals, which are dominated by China and in which the US trails badly. The second, Groundbreaking, traces the US policy approach to rare metals over the last 50+ years; this made for dispiriting reading, but it explained why the US trails badly. This book takes a much broader, and not entirely US-centric look at the subject.Let me start with a minor quibble about the title of the book. Just from the title you might think that the focus was principally on political, military or financial power. All of these are examined, but it’s emphasis is on rare metals and their broader impact on our world.The author gives a brief review of the impact of various metals, bronze, iron,, etc., in past history. He looks at the social and political advantages conferred by various metals over time. But he spends the majority of his efforts on the seventeen rare metals, which have come into broad use only within the last230 to 50 years.He devotes one chapter to corporations and their effect on the mining, processing and use of rare metals. One corporation, CBMM, is a Brazilian company that is a major producer of niobium. One use of niobium is to strengthen steel. CBMM can produce niobium at a price that its competitors find difficult to meet. Consequently, it can influence the market for this rare metal. I found the example of this company helpful in better understanding the market.The book looks at the challenging aspects of processing the rocks to produce the rare metals in usable forms and amounts. This is not a simple process; in fact, many steps are needed to coax these metals into usable form. In some respects, the processing at times may be more art than science. The process requires metallurgists and others with both training and experience to undertake this effort successfully. Because the US has outsourced so much of the production of rare metals that it no longer has a deep bench of metallurgists and others who know how to perform this work successfully. I could see what the author was saying and I found it troubling.He also looks at the networks that trade rare metals. Learning about the people who buy and sell rare metals identified another dimension of rare metals. I found this interesting.As we seek to electronify cars, solar and wind power systems,, smartphones, toothbrushes, and much else, our need for these rare metals grows exponentially. Will there be enough of these metals to accomplish current social objectives? The book doesn’t give an answer.One last issue that I will look at in this review is environmental impacts. The author argues that rare metals can have a green impact, but the book looks at the very substantial environmental impacts in China and elsewhere from the mining and processing of these metals. I believe that the book will present a challenge to environmental demands. To have an electric vehicle, a smartphone, an electrical system powered by solar and wind, these metals are essential and essential in very large amounts. Securing these metals has significant environmental impacts. As the author says on page 225: “Wealthy governments should not outsource pollution.” Therein lies the challenge.The book examines much more than I have outlined. I found it most informative. If the subject interests you, I recommend it highly.

Livro muito bem escrito, detalhando as necessidades cada vez maiores de determinados minérios para os nossos aparelhos do dia-a-dia, como o smartphone, com uma crescente carga tecnológica. Por conta disso, a exploração de regiões antes consideradas como inviáveis (como o solo e subsolo marítimo) acaba tomando a forma de uma corrida incessante em termos de conflito empresarial e interestatal. Além disso, todo esse processo carrega consigo uma tendência crescente de impacto no ambiente. Livro importante e fundamental para se manter atualizado em termos de mundo, desafios e problemas.

Great study and write from Mr Abraham. It's a perfect book to discover a hide world around the rare earth elements.

Very well written. Clear description of a complicated subject matter. Good scholarship mixed with real-life experience. Thoughtful. No polemics. It was recommended to me by a Canadian member of parliament and I've already started to recommend it to others. And thank you to the author for bringing this to the public.

Amongst the flurry of books over the last few years focusing on the geopolitics of metals and mining, and in particular the so-called ‘critical metals’ David Abraham’s effort “The Elements of Power” promises a less-hyperbolic and more pragmatic approach to the subject, even offering some useful advice to policy-makers responsible for regulating this sector. In his own words: “My fear is that a lack of attention to and understanding… of the Rare Metal Age…, will limit our prosperity and undermine our environment. My hope is that this book… will serve as a rallying call to inspire a new generation to learn more about the ingredients of our gadgets, guns and sustainable future.”As a not-entirely uneducated reader on this subject, I can say that Mr. Abraham, a natural resource strategist, who has worked on Wall Street, for an African-NGO, the White House and the Japanese government, delivers on this promise. The book should be added to the shelf of anyone who wants to understand the future of mining, metals and raw materials supply to industry, or anyone who is involved with policy-making in these areas.Having met Mr. Abraham myself a few times at various obscure minor metals conferences in China, I can testify that the book has been extremely well-researched, undertaken over a period of several years. By way of disclosure, Mr. Abraham has been kind enough to include a few of my comments and observations on the industry in the book, so you will find me in the references and acknowledgements.I have noted that Mr. Abraham has often disappeared, from the conferences we were attending, for a day-or-two to track down an obscure metals plant or mercurial industry-insider. The critical metals issue is often presented as a grand geopolitical battle involving federal governments in China, the United States, Europe and Japan, with the WTO playing a brokering role. The minor metals industry, as the name suggests, however, is played out by small-scale business and industry, local government officials, family-run metals traders and one-man band analysts and advisors. As such, Mr. Abraham’s book undoubtedly benefits from his efforts to locate and introduce us to some of the interesting characters within the minor metals industry.The book starts with an introductory chapter on role of minor metals in the modern economy – a situation still not well-understood by much of the populace. Whilst not necessarily providing the backbone of the industrial economy they make the products we use that bit smaller, faster, cheaper and more powerful. This will probably be the first time many readers will have read about esoteric metals such as beryllium, bismuth, cadmium, cobalt, gallium, hafnium, indium, lithium, niobium, scandium, selenium, tantalum, tellurium, tungsten, vanadium, zirconium, and the ‘rare earths’.Following the introductory chapter Mr. Abraham takes us on a journey through the minor metals supply chain, with each chapter focusing on a key part of the supply chain, or a critical issue affecting the industry. Each chapter is enlivened by Mr. Abraham’s field visits and ‘local contacts’.The second chapter looks at the geological distribution of minor metals, and the inevitable geopolitical consequences of some being found in one place, but not the other – conflict of one form or another. The next chapter looks at the business of mining and its slightly grubby nature, dramatized by a field visit to the giant Araxa niobium mine in Brazil which dominates/controls global niobium supply – a metal which improves the performance of steel. Next he looks at the technical challenges of processing rare metals such as the rare earths, tantalum and niobium, and more importantly the lack of engineering talent in the West to do this. Almost inevitably Mr. Abraham finds himself in a former ‘not-on-the-map’ Soviet industrial city, now in Estonia, to find out about the lost art of rare metals processing, and suffering minor fluorine gas poisoning for his travails. Mr. Abraham then looks at how the metals find their way to the market, via network of small traders, including ‘Super Mario’ and a ‘Grateful Dead’ fan and small exchanges, including the Fanya exchange, one of a long line of failed Chinese financial exchanges.Having reached the market, Mr. Abraham then looks at the parts of the economy most reliant on the rare metals – starting with the tech sector, noting that a mobile phone now contains barium, beryllium, boron, cobalt, gallium, strontium, tantalum, titanium, and numerous rare earth metals. Of course, every other industrial sector is now reliant on the tech sector, only multiplying the problem – for example, Mr. Abraham tells us that a Boeing 747 requires six million components sourced from thirty countries. The next industrial sector covered is the nascent green economy, and the use of rare metals in critical new technologies such as wind turbines and hybrid cars. This presents a challenging paradox for environmentalists in that green energy requires more mining for these metals, which are often in the unregulated, disreputable fringes of the mining industry. The final industrial sector reviewed is the military-industrial complex, with rare metals inevitable in use in high-tech missiles and planes. The new F-35 is described as a flying periodic table. Much of the hyperbole about ‘critical metals’ arises from their use by the US military.To draw the book to a close, Mr. Abraham then looks to the future, trying to work out how we can balance our industrial growth and economic development without irreconcilably damaging our planet. The point is brought home with a visit to rural Jiangxi, China to see the environmental damage and exploitative working conditions of an artisanal rare earths mining facility – making the point that we in the West in many cases have simply outsourced pollution, rather than reduced it. The challenges of recycling minor metals that are found in just a few percent in most industrial products, highlights why we are still reliant on such mines in China to supply these metals. Mr. Abraham then reviews policy-making around the world in relation to the critical metals issue, finding the US and Europe somewhat behind China, Japan and South Korea in their thinking, despite calls for help from the WTO.In a magnificent final chapter, Mr. Abraham offers some pragmatic advice for policy-makers in the West, free from the usual self-interest that usually accompanies such advocacy (subsidies, patronage, etc.). The answer to securing stable supplies of these metals does not reside with the WTO, but in Western efforts to find and build more rare metal mines, advance our technical know-how of mining and processing them, establish robust and sustainable supply-chains, train more geologists and engineers, improve mining and industrial permitting procedures, and encourage transparency in metals’ markets, whilst avoiding wasteful subsidies, quotas and stockpiles. Simple, practical advice that surely is not too hard to deliver?Mr. Abraham’s new book, “The Elements of Power”, enters an area of non-fiction that, to date has been poorly-served by the book-writing community. Mr. Abraham has provided an invaluable popular non-fiction text which looks at a quite staggering range of issues in just 288 pages. It is accessible, concise and nuanced, even daring enough to offer some pragmatic advice on how governments and industry can better prepare for a future in which minor metals are bound to play a more significant role in the global economy.

I can see what he is trying to say, but he is a bit short of detail and it sounds like a sermon in the end. A disappointment