Recently, news about rare metals has garnered widespread attention in China's mining industry.
According to the latest data from the Chinese mining sector, China's rhenium resources have reached 787 tons, ranking second in the world, and are sufficient for use for over 300 years.
This groundbreaking achievement provides strong support for China's development in high-tech fields and enhances China's position in the global competition for extremely rare metal resources, making the country more resilient against international constraints in the mining sector.
So, what exactly is rhenium, and why has the announcement of its reserves attracted so much attention?
Rhenium is one of the elements located towards the end of the periodic table and is extremely scarce in nature.
In the earth's crust, the abundance of rhenium is only about 0.000001 parts per million, highlighting its rarity.
In addition to its scarcity, rhenium possesses many excellent natural properties; in short, it is a rare and magical special metal.
Rhenium's stability, heat resistance, and chemical inertness make it indispensable in the aerospace field.
As a silver-white transition metal, rhenium has extremely high wear resistance and corrosion resistance. Its melting point reaches 3186°C, more than twice that of steel, and its boiling point is 5627°C.
It is this high-temperature resistance that makes rhenium critically important in jet engines and industrial gas turbines.
Furthermore, rhenium has very high hardness.
Materials prepared from rhenium through chemical vapor deposition (CVD) can achieve a Vickers hardness of 608HV in the cross-section and 686HV in the longitudinal section, with a combined hardness of 647HV.
In comparison, common 304 stainless steel typically has a Vickers hardness between 190HV and 250HV, making rhenium more than 2.5 times harder.
Due to its high melting point, boiling point, hardness, and excellent high-temperature and corrosion resistance properties, rhenium has extremely important applications in the aerospace industry.
For instance, it is used to manufacture turbine blades, turbine disks, and combustion chambers for jet engines, aircraft structural components, propulsion systems for spacecraft, and circuit boards that need to withstand high temperatures.
Rhenium is an indispensable metal material for making high-thrust engines and is also widely used in optical fibers, high-temperature alloys, catalysts, semiconductors, special glass, petroleum extraction, and advanced medical equipment.
Because of its unique physical and chemical properties, rhenium is known as the "vitamin of modern industry."
However, as an extremely valuable and rare strategic resource, the global distribution of rhenium is highly uneven.
For a long time, China has relied on imports for rhenium materials, presenting certain supply risks.
Previously, an international geological agency report stated that as of 2018, the world's proven rhenium reserves were about 2500 tons, with a total resource estimate of about 10,000 to 11,000 tons.
However, since 2021, with the discovery of more rhenium mines, rhenium resources have been found in 618 deposits worldwide.
According to the latest paper "Rhenium Mineral Resources: Global Assessment" published in the Western scientific journal Sciencedirect, the global rhenium reserves range between 55,000 and 140,000 tons, with the best estimate being 83,000 tons, eight times the previous estimate.
Currently, the global annual demand for rhenium is about 50 tons, meaning that even at the lowest estimated reserve, the supply can meet global demand for several centuries.
On April 9, 2024, the official website of Chinese Mining also published a report titled "Characteristics and Current Status of China's Rhenium Exploration, Development, and Utilization," which shows that as of 2021, China's confirmed rhenium reserves totaled 787.41 tons.
With China consuming 2.5 tons of rhenium per year, this amount is sufficient for over 300 years of exploitation.
More importantly, China's actual reserves might be significantly higher than this figure.
In recent years, to break the monopoly in the international mining sector, Chinese geological explorers have actively conducted resource and geological surveys, and mining companies have continuously improved the development and utilization of rhenium resources.
After years of effort, China's exploration and development of rhenium resources have finally achieved a major breakthrough.
Currently, global rhenium production and supply are mainly concentrated in countries like Chile, the United States, and Poland.
According to the "Global Rhenium Production in 2021" report published by Statista, eight countries have high rhenium production, with Chile at the top with 18.88 tons, followed by the United States with 9.29 tons, Poland with 6.4 tons, and China with 2.5 tons.
Other countries with high production include Uzbekistan with 2.37 tons, Russia with 2 tons, Kazakhstan with 1 ton, and Armenia with 0.17 tons.
In the future, as China increases its development and application of rhenium resources, annual rhenium production is expected to rise to between 3 and 5 tons.
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