AVS 58th Annual International Symposium and Exhibition
    Energy Frontiers Focus Topic Thursday Sessions
       Session EN+MS+VT-ThA

Invited Paper EN+MS+VT-ThA1
Waste Not, Want Not

Thursday, November 3, 2011, 2:00 pm, Room 102

Session: Photovoltaics Manufacturing
Presenter: Lindsey V. Maness, Jr., South Park Platinum, Inc.
Correspondent: Click to Email
Rapidly increasing demand for certain geological commodities, in particular semi-conductors, rare earth elements (REE) and those with other desirable characteristics, are making the extraction of formerly ignored elements of significant financial interest for miners, recyclers and other commodity producers. This need is tempered by legal and regulatory requirements that minimize pollution. Historically, miners, smelters and others have used almost all the physical, chemical and electromagnetic characteristics of ores as a means of extraction and concentration – with the exception of the unique benefits afforded by processing in vacuums. Vacuum use enables the clean separation and capture of many commodities that heretofore were wasted, either up smokestacks, in water, or in waste dumps, etc. As a side-benefit, the coating with certain REE, etc., of heated surfaces will enable the selective emission of optimized thermal frequencies for use in generating electricity using Thermal PhotoVoltaics (TPV) technologies: this major improvement in TPV efficiency will result from the suppression in a vacuum of transfer of energy via conduction and convection. In addition, for the many commodities that vaporize selectively in vacuums, a vacuum-smelter would enable the non-polluting capture of all processed materials. Such capabilities will enable revolutionizing the economics of many operations, since the removal of one component from a mix will increase proportionally the relative percentages of the other components. This development will bring closer the goal of “No Waste Mining” and of the separation and use of certain otherwise useful constituents, such as arsenic, which are considered harmful, are tightly regulated and whose disposal is presently a very high cost-item.