How useful is tungsten? Not less than the value of rare earths, the United States also imports from China
Some countries can get a good position in the world as long as they have a lot of natural resources. For example, some countries in the Middle East have very rich oil resources and are very easy to mine, which has created a group of local tyrants in the Middle East, and in China they have very high reserves of tungsten ore, whose value is not inferior to that of rare earths. Even the United States needs to obtain China imports, but China sold the price of "earth" for a period of time, and did not sell the price of "rare", what is going on?
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What is the role of tungsten? Maybe everyone is familiar with it, because we have heard the story of Edison's improvement of light bulbs when we were young. In order to find suitable materials to use as filaments, no matter how many times he failed, he still did not give up, and tested more than 3,000 kinds of conductive materials. , and finally decided to use tungsten as a filament.
In this story, what most of us learned was Edison's spirit of never giving up no matter how many times he failed, but there is actually more to this story. Although electric lamps had been built at that time, due to the poor selection of filament materials, the life of electric lamps was relatively short, and there was no practical application value at all, so the lighting equipment at that time was still realized by coal or kerosene.
After Edison used the tungsten filament as the filament of the electric lamp, the life of the electric lamp could reach 1000 hours, which is the electric lamp with practical application value. At the same time, after the emergence of tungsten light bulbs, the impact on coal and kerosene was also very large, and even their stock prices plummeted by 12%.
Therefore, the role of tungsten in the social economy is very large. The use of tungsten as a filament is just a very simple application, because tungsten actually has two characteristics: first, tungsten has the highest melting point among all metal elements in nature, exceeding 3400 ℃, and tungsten filament is used as an electric lamp. Silk uses this characteristic of it; second, the hardness of tungsten in nature is also very high, and its status is only second only to diamond, and it ranks second in nature, but because the main component of diamond is carbon element , it is sometimes unable to replace metal tungsten in applications. As long as the two major characteristics of tungsten are utilized, the application range of tungsten is also very wide.
Because tungsten has the advantage of high hardness, as long as tungsten is added to some steel forging to make alloy steel, its hardness can also be greatly improved. As early as the 19th century, German scientists discovered that adding tungsten to the barrel of the gun Tungsten can prolong the service life; and in World War II, the German Tiger tank used tungsten carbide as the core of the shell, which can not only increase the hardness of the shell, but also increase the power of the shell, so this tank was also used in World War II. People were very impressed.
But in fact, in modern times, people use tungsten more widely. For example, some key components in gas turbines, rockets, missiles and nuclear reactors generally need to withstand very high temperatures in order to make these equipment work well. Other metal materials are difficult to do, only tungsten has natural High temperature resistance, so these devices need to use tungsten.
Moreover, the hardness of tungsten is also widely used. The tungsten carbide-based cemented carbide has higher hardness and wear resistance, and can also withstand higher temperatures. Therefore, if the tungsten carbide-based cemented carbide is used The resulting cutting tool has a much better cutting speed and effect than ordinary alloys.
However, these applications are only a part of the application of tungsten. It can also be widely used in the manufacture of firearms, armor-piercing bullets, drills, superhard molds, etc., and can also be involved in mining, metallurgy, construction, transportation, electronics, and chemical industries. , light industry and aerospace and other important fields, so it is very widely used, and its importance is not inferior to rare earths.
It is such a natural resource, but China's reserves account for a relatively high proportion in the world, more than half. According to data released by the US Geological Survey, as of 2018, the world's proven reserves of tungsten resources are 3.3 million tons, of which China's reserves are as high as 1.9 million tons, accounting for about 58% of the world's total; ranking second Canada has 290,000 tons, followed by Russia with 250,000 tons, and the United States has only 140,000 tons, so the United States is not enough for 1/13 of China's reserves.
However, there is a big gap between the data released by the United States and the data released by China, because until 2018, the data released by my country showed that the proven reserves of tungsten ore were 10.7157 million tons, but there is not much contradiction here, because the United States The published data is based on the reserves of pure tungsten after tungsten ore purification. It is not surprising that China's pure tungsten reserves have become 1.9 million tons, but it is not so accurate just to estimate the reserves of a tungsten ore. It is even more difficult to say whether the data is accurate or not after estimating the purified data.
It is precisely because of the recognition that the application of tungsten resources is very extensive and its importance is very prominent, but as a natural resource, it is also limited, so by 2018, the US Department of Commerce has included tungsten in the list of 35 key minerals. The meaning is also very clear, that is, to control and reserve tungsten, only to explore, but not to mine.
Not only the United States attaches great importance to tungsten resources, but even Europe, Japan, South Korea and other countries have similar actions. The tungsten resources of these countries have been controlled, but their demand is still relatively high. How to use it? In fact, a large part of the tungsten resources in these countries are imported from China.
The reserves of tungsten resources in China are indeed relatively high, but it is precisely because there are mines at home that some people do not know how to cherish these resources. From 2015 to 2019, China's cumulative export of tungsten products reached 141,000 tons, accounting for about 100,000 tons in the world. Half of the consumer market, more than 80% of which are exported to Europe, America, Japan, South Korea and other countries, but we have not sold at a good price.
China has relatively abundant tungsten resources, which should have been a trump card. However, due to the lack of domestic technology for the overall utilization of tungsten, there is still a large gap in the processing of tungsten, so our external sales are very simple. Tungsten processed products have relatively low technical added value, and of course it is difficult to sell at a good price.
Sometimes it's not a technical issue, it's probably a matter of interest. In 2015, China's tungsten resources even sold at a low price of 50,000 yuan per ton. This was because foreign companies began to purchase tungsten resources in large quantities, resulting in a sudden increase in international demand for tungsten resources, but domestic businessmen saw After this situation, we increased our efforts to mine tungsten ore and continuously provided tungsten products to the world. All of a sudden, it led to overcapacity, and the treasures in our hands could only be sold at low prices.
You must know that the industry standard for tungsten resources at that time was 85,000 yuan per ton, but domestic merchants sold 50,000 yuan per ton, which was far below the industry standard. It's a big loss.
Fortunately, the country has also seen this situation clearly. If this situation is allowed to develop, we may need to use high prices to buy from foreign countries in the future. Therefore, China has also begun to pay attention to the mining of tungsten ore, limited mining, and included tungsten in the list of strategic minerals in 2016. This method cannot change the situation of my country's export of tungsten resources to the world, but the price of tungsten has begun to It has rebounded greatly, at least not in terms of price.
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To sum up, tungsten is a very important strategic resource, because it plays a very prominent position in various industries, as long as some tungsten is added to the material, it is possible to greatly improve the performance of the material, not only for Some people's livelihood fields are widely used, and they also play a very active role in the military, aerospace and other fields.
Although my country's tungsten resource reserves are relatively large, due to the relatively backward technology, only some low-processed tungsten products can often be sold. The added value of technology is relatively low, and it is difficult to sell a better price. In addition, domestic businessmen follow the trend of investment behavior. , once caused overcapacity, tungsten products can only be sold at relatively low prices.
In fact, these are very valuable resources. Some developed countries such as Europe and the United States have already listed them as strategic resources. Domestic minerals are usually only detected and not mined, and then imported to other countries. The purpose is actually very obvious. China's tungsten resources are almost fully exploited, and the advantages of this resource are in the hands of Western countries.
Of course, we can't let the Western countries' strategies succeed, but it's not easy to change this situation, and the key to changing this situation lies in technology. Only when we master more advanced technology, we can manufacture more high-end tungsten products. Products can naturally be sold at a good price, and there is no need to sell those low-end products and let others control our resources. What do you think?
