(ORDO NEWS) — Speaking at Investor Day, Tesla CEO Elon Musk revealed that the company will develop a motor for permanent magnet electric vehicles without the use of rare earths.
Due to the difficulty in obtaining supplies and the fact that China accounts for the vast majority of global production, rare earths are a source of friction in electric vehicle supply chains.
There are many misconceptions about what a rare earth is and how much of it is used in electric vehicles. In fact, rare earth elements are often absent from lithium-ion batteries.
Electric vehicle (EV) engines use rare earths, not batteries. The most popular is neodymium, which is used to make strong magnets for electric motors, hard drives, and speakers.
Neodymium magnets often contain additions of dysprosium and terbium.
Moreover, not all electric vehicle engines use rare earth elements. Tesla uses them in their DC permanent magnet motors, but not in AC induction motors.
Initially, Tesla cars were powered by AC induction motors that did not require rare earths.
When the Model 3 was released, the company introduced an entirely new permanent magnet motor and then began using these motors in all of its other vehicles.
Tesla recently announced that by improving drivetrain efficiency over the past five years, it has been able to reduce the use of rare earths by 25 percent in its new Model 3 drives.
Now it seems that Tesla is trying to combine the best of both worlds by using a rare earth-free permanent magnet motor.
The Tesla CEO’s response was vague when asked about the exact materials he uses, possibly because he treats this information as a trade secret that he does not intend to divulge.
As for the future engine, the image provided by the company shows that it will have a permanent magnet but will not use rare earths.
Tesla engineers spent 10 years looking for other possible materials that could be used instead of neodymium.
Elon Musk has not yet specified which one he intends to use, but it looks like he is close to choosing, or at least he believes that a better one will be found soon.
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