Abstract
Strategically critical elements are becoming significant for the rising demand of emerging energy-efficient technologies and high-tech applications. These critical elements are mostly geologically dispersed, and mainly recovered from recycled materials. Coal with high concentrations of critical elements is supposed to stable alternative sources. The abundances of critical elements in coal varies widely among different deposits and regions. The high concentrations of critical elements are found in many Chinese and Russian coal ores. The global mining potential ratio (MPR) is applied and suggests scandium, hafnium, cesium, yttrium, germanium, gallium, thallium, strontium and rare-earth elements could be potential recovery from coal. A number of benefits are expected with the extraction of critical elements during coal utilization.
Highlights
Rare metals, known as lithium (Li), gallium (Ga), Germanium (Ge), rare-earth elements (REE), and platinum group elements (PGE) are regarded as strategic mineral resources, which are indispensable substances of emerging energy-efficient technologies or high-tech applications for their unique electrical, magnetic, catalytic, metallurgical, nuclear and luminescent characteristics [1,2,3,4,5,6,7]
∑ Pj × Cj where MPR represents the mining potential ratio of element i; MQij represents the summation of quantity of element i (Tg) accompanying coal production of country j; GPi is the global conventional production of element i (Tg); Pj is the coal production of country j (Tg); Cj is the elemental abundance in coal from country j
Coal is an organic resource formatted by long-term biological and geological processes
Summary
Known as lithium (Li), gallium (Ga), Germanium (Ge), rare-earth elements (REE), and platinum group elements (PGE) are regarded as strategic mineral resources, which are indispensable substances of emerging energy-efficient technologies or high-tech applications for their unique electrical, magnetic, catalytic, metallurgical, nuclear and luminescent characteristics [1,2,3,4,5,6,7]. The concentrations of critical elements in metalliferous coal may be equal to (or even higher than) conventional ores, enriched in coal combustion products with the decomposition of organic matter during high-temperature oxidation [16,17]. The concentrations, associations, enrichment genetic and extraction technologies of critical elements (Ga, Ge, Li, U, REE, PGE) in metalliferous coals have received fairly intensive study [17,20,21,23,27]. The quantitatively investigation of potential significance of coal as an alternative critical element resource is necessary
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