Petition written by: Dongmin Choo, Josh Kim, Kevin Jang

REE's, or Rare Earth Elements are seventeen elements that are part of the lanthanides and actinides including scandium and yttrium. There are two types of rare earth elements, light REE's and heavy REE's. Like the name implies, REEs are literally the lighter and heavier REE's in terms of weight. Rare earth elements have similar properties with one another such as: high electrical conductivity, high luster, and are silvery metals. Rare earth elements, contrary to their name, are not actually rare, there is a plentiful amount of them in the world. However, there is a low tendency of them to be in big deposits. Rare earth elements are considered the "technology elements", as REEs are a crucial part of technology in modern times. REE's are used most of the things we use in our daily lives, such as: phones, tv's, batteries, cars, radios, etc. Our society depends on REEs to carry out our daily necessities, however, we are starting to run out...

So, what makes the rare earth elements so desirable? First of all, REEs have high conductivity to electricity. The products which REEs are used the most, such as cell phones, batteries, and cars, all require electricity to function. The high conductivity of REEs make the function of the products run smoothly. REEs are very resistant to heat. The high heat capacity of REEs is crucial in electronics, where temperatures quickly rise when in use. Also, compared to other metals, REEs have lower elasticity, or "stretchiness". The crystal structures of REEs show that the atoms in REEs have low repelling towards each other and therefore have lower thermal expansion points. It is hard for REEs inside the electronics to get damaged.

Each element in the lanthanides have six energy levels, and the electrons fill up from the fourth energy level, until the fourth level fills up to 32, fifth level to 9, and sixth energy level stays the same, 2. Next, each element in the actinides have seven energy levels in total, and the electrons fill up from the fourth energy level, until the fourth level fills up to 32, fifth level to 32, sixth energy level to 9, and the seventh energy stays the same, 2. Two other REEs are in the transitional metals, which are Scandium and Yttrium, and both elements have two valence electron; however, Yttrium has one more energy level than Scandium. The electron configuration of the lanthanides starts with [Xe] 5d1 6s2, Lanthium, to [Xe] 4f14 5d1 6s1, Lutetium, with 4f increasing by one after Lanthium.The electron configuration of the actinides starts with [Rn] 6d1 7s1, Actinium, to [Rn] 5f14 6d1 7s1, Lawrencium, with 5f increasing by one faster Actinium. The electron configuration of Scandium is [Ar] 3d1 4s2, and Yttrium is [Kr] 4d1 5s2.

The electronegativity of the lanthanides and the actinides are between 1.1~1.7, which are close to the electronegativity in first half of the transitional metal that include Scandium and Yttrium, and first half of the alkaline earth metals. The ionization energy of the lanthanides and the actinides are about 530 kJ/mol ~ 640 kJ/mol, which are similar to the second half of the alkaline earth metals, and first two column of the transitional metal that include Scandium and Yttrium. The melting of the lanthanides and the actinides are between 830~1670 Celsius, which are close to the first half of the alkaline earth metal, first half of transitional metal that include Scandium and Yttrium. The atomic mass of the lanthanides and the actinides are between 140 ~ 265 amu, which are similar to last two columns of transitional metal, and the second half of the columns in the non metal; Scandium and Yttrium's atomic mass differ from the rest of lanthanides and actinides, which are 45 for Scandium and 89 for Yttrium.

Today, the high demand for rare earth elements has led to decreased supply. China, the world's largest exporter of rare earth elements with seventy percent, is experiencing shortage of REEs. However, many REE reserves are located in areas that are hard to gain access. While China is trying to gain control of North Korea's REE supplies, diplomatic issues remain between North Korea and the most of the world. Mining underwater is very costly and can possibly destroy underwater ecosystems. Mining in space such as in the Moon where REEs are abundant is also costly and requires more development in technology. Recycling REEs is also not a good option as the process is difficult and takes long period of time. Therefore, a better solution to the REE shortage problem is needed to keep up with today's technology market.

While rare earth elements are vital in our daily lives, the extraction of rare earth metals have also created negative effects towards the environment. Extraction of rare earth metals not only emits pollution which damages the health of organisms and destroys the ecosystems, but also affects safety of humans by causing natural disasters. In fact, every process of extraction is involved in environmental damage. Mining rare earth metals from the ground damages the surface of earth as heavy machinery is used to open the surface of earth. The damage in the surface of earth leads to the damage of ecosystem in the area. Also, toxic chemicals are released to the surface during the mining process.After REEs are mined, REEs go through refining process to be pure for use. During the refining process metals, which are hard to remove, are released in air, ground, and water causing the organisms who lives in the area to suffer. Finally, disposing REEs lead to water pollution. As the result, China have cut down the amount of REE exported. However, environmental damage continues as long as current method of mining also continues.

Our proposed solution is to mine Thorium in the United States. Thorium is in plentiful quantities in the United States, to be more specific, in Idaho. Thorium itself is a more safer, efficient, and plentiful than other rare earth elements such as uranium. Idaho contains the purest, most plentiful amount of in the whole world. There are places in the world that contains thorium as well, however, are taxing to remove from other materials. However, this solution still contains the problem of radioactivity. Therefore we propose to use the green refinement method to make lower the radioactivity of the thorium. The green refinement method uses bacteria to oxidize the metals, and thereby creating a green alternative without much danger involved. By using the solution that we proposed, we can create a safe alternative to the old methods involved. There won't be as much waste, and the world will be a cleaner place, without the loss of our advancements that humanity has made in the past hundred years.

The method of extraction should also change through bioleaching. Bioleaching is a form of green refinement which uses naturally-occurring and harmless bacteria to obtain pure rare earth elements. The process of bioleaching is simple. Bacterias that gain energy through oxidation and can endure high metal concentrations (sulfolobus and Leptospirillum ferrooxidans) are kept in containers and oxidize metal sulfides. The process takes about five to six days and the result of bioleaching is metal sulfates. Bioleaching has many advantages compared to traditional way of refining metals. First, the cost of bioleaching is cheaper than the traditional method due to simple process. Bioleaching is also eco-friendly as bioleaching uses naturally-occurring and harmless bacteria. Bioleaching also does not release harmful chemicals such as sulfur dioxide and arsenic gases. Finally, while bioleaching takes more time than the traditional method, the high recovery rate using bioleaching would make the process effective in long term.

Synthetic element is one of plausible solution to REE problem. The positive aspect about this solution is that we can artificially produce elements out of more common elements, such as technetium, which was first element to be synthesized. However, the downside to this solution is that transfermium elements, elements at atomic number of 101 or greater, are produced in very small quantities, therefore, the half lives of the transfermium elements are ranged from minutes to milliseconds; the people need time to identify the new elements by chemical separation. Additionally, many of the synthetic elements also have very short life too. So even if we do make a new synthetic elements, it will be hard to make them in use, since the elements last only for few minutes at longest. Another possible solution is to make North Korea as an independent state that doesn't rely on China, so China won't be able to take advantage to take the REEs from North Korea. However, if we make North Korea an independent state that doesn't rely on China's support, North Korea can monopolize the REEs that they have in their land, which will make even harder to get the REEs from North Korea. So we thought that changing the way that countries manufacture/mine the REEs that are reserved in its own countries would be the best solution, and that is why we think that our solution is better than the rest.

<Models and Diagrams regarding our petition>

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PLzSrT64bX-8SjWqkUatpHIg_CDTV3BXKrErcNrpKiY

Thank you for reading and please sign!

<Citations>

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fbtU3yFEX-5Td2hekpnKFkZUsZT2O0LRz2ZS9yi9yZc