[HN Gopher] Cheap yet ultrapure titanium might enable widespread...
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Cheap yet ultrapure titanium might enable widespread use in
industry (2024)
Author : westurner
Score : 62 points
Date : 2025-06-04 22:00 UTC (4 days ago)
(HTM) web link (phys.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (phys.org)
| westurner wrote:
| > _Unfortunately, producing ultrapure titanium is significantly
| more expensive than manufacturing steel (an iron alloy) and
| aluminum, owing to the substantial use of energy and resources in
| preparing high-purity titanium. Developing a cheap, easy way to
| prepare it--and facilitate product development for industry and
| common consumers--is the problem the researchers aimed to
| address._
|
| "Direct production of low-oxygen-concentration titanium from
| molten titanium" (2024)
| https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-49085-4
| Animats wrote:
| Any comments from someone in the metals industry? The paper
| shows this process being done at lab scale. It needs to be
| scaled up to steel mill size. How hard does that look?
| more_corn wrote:
| Just gotta solve the yttrium issue and it's ready for prime
| time. Maybe they could introduce a sort of spider to consume
| the yttrium...
| metalman wrote:
| there may be no yttrium issue
|
| from wiki: Small amounts of yttrium (0.1 to 0.2%) have been
| used to reduce the grain sizes of chromium, molybdenum,
| titanium, and zirconium.[81] Yttrium is used to increase
| the strength of aluminium and magnesium alloys.[15] The
| addition of yttrium to alloys generally improves
| workability, adds resistance to high-temperature
| recrystallization, and significantly enhances resistance to
| high-temperature oxidation (see graphite nodule discussion
| below).[68]
|
| Yttrium can be used to deoxidize vanadium and other non-
| ferrous metals.[15] Yttria stabilizes the cubic form of
| zirconia in jewelry.[82]
|
| Yttrium has been studied as a nodulizer in ductile cast
| iron, forming the graphite into compact nodules instead of
| flakes to increase ductility and fatigue resistance.[15]
| Having a high melting point, yttrium oxide is used in some
| ceramic and glass to impart shock resistance and low
| thermal expansion properties.[15] Those same properties
| make such glass useful in camera lenses.[51]
|
| Medical
| westurner wrote:
| What a useful question though. I hadn't realized that the
| cost of titanium is due to lack of a process for removing
| oxygen.
|
| What is the most efficient and sustainable alternative to
| yttrium for removing oxygen from titanium?
|
| process(TiO2, ...) => Ti, ...
| westurner wrote:
| From teh Gemini 2.5 Pro AI "expert", with human review:
|
| > _For primary titanium production (from ore): Molten Salt
| Electrolysis (Direct Electrochemical Deoxygenation, FFC
| Cambridge, OS processes, etc.) and calciothermic reduction
| in molten salts_
|
| > _They aim to_ [sic.] _revolutionize titanium production
| by moving away from the energy-intensive and
| environmentally impactful Kroll process, directly reducing
| TiO 2 and offering the potential for closed-loop systems._
|
| > _For recycling titanium scrap and deep deoxidation:
| Hydrogen plasma arc melting and calcium-based deoxidation
| techniques (especially electrochemical calcium generation)
| are highly promising. Hydrogen offers extreme cleanliness,
| while calcium offers potent deoxidizing power._
|
| ...
|
| > _Magnesium Hydride Reduction (e.g., University of Utah 's
| reactor)_
|
| > _Solid-State Reduction (e.g., Metalysis process)_
|
| Are there more efficient, sustainable methods of titanium
| production?
|
| Also, TIL Ti is a catalyst for CNT carbon nanotube
| production; and, alloying CNTs with Ti leaves vacancies.
| mmooss wrote:
| > with human review
|
| What human?
| jjcm wrote:
| Surely this is something that will go down in price as energy
| costs do, regardless of the yttrium approach, correct? With solar
| getting cheaper and fusion on the horizon, won't that address the
| problem as well? I wonder if this intermediary step is necessary
| if so.
| fnord77 wrote:
| > fusion on the horizon
|
| fusion is not on the horizon
| _aavaa_ wrote:
| Oh it is, in the same way mirages appear on the horizon.
| more_corn wrote:
| In the same way the pot of gold is at the end of the
| rainbow. Close enough to see, never close enough to reach.
| steve_adams_86 wrote:
| My 7 year old told me he found the pot of gold last year,
| so it seems to me that we should be more optimistic about
| fusion
| rjsw wrote:
| How many times have you arrived at the horizon?
| Electricniko wrote:
| It is at sunrise and sunset.
| guide42 wrote:
| Best moments to watch the fission.
| jonasenordin wrote:
| And it's actually a good thing that it hasn't come any
| closer.
| BirAdam wrote:
| Maybe? If anyone has better knowledge on whether or not this
| is legitimate, that would be cool to know.
|
| https://www.businessinsider.com/helion-energy-fusion-
| company...
| dehrmann wrote:
| It's 20 years away.
| foota wrote:
| Looks like they applied for a patent here:
| https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=WO20...
| Aurornis wrote:
| This is very cool indeed, but I laughed when I got to the
| conclusion:
|
| > A limitation of this work is that the resulting de-oxygenated
| titanium contains yttrium, up to 1% by mass; yttrium can
| influence the mechanical and chemical properties of titanium
| alloy. After solving the yttrium contamination problem...
|
| So the process removes the oxygen but then adds yttrium to the
| metal in significant amounts. That's not quite the ultra pure
| titanium I was promised in the headline.
|
| As always, I hope someone figures out the rest of the problem
| space. As-is, this looks like trading one problem for another.
| foota wrote:
| I'm not sure if it makes it easier, but there are some
| differences between the high oxygen titanium alloy and titanium
| with some yttrium in it that might make it easier to separate?
|
| Presumably when you melt the titanium the yttrium doesn't
| react, whereas the oxygen dissolved in the titanium alloy at
| room temperature will form titanium dioxide when it's heated
| (if I'm reading correctly). So maybe you could "just" separate
| the molten metal by density afterwards? I'm not sure this would
| work though. For one, you'd need to avoid re-introducing oxygen
| contamination, but I guess you could do it under a vacuum (yes
| "just" spin the molten metal at high speed in a vacuum)?
|
| This would seem to me to beg the question of why not just grind
| up the titanium in a vacuum to remove the oxygen and then melt
| it down, so I might be missing something here.
| LasEspuelas wrote:
| Agreed. The original paper states that they have a technique
| to remove oxygen from the surface of titanium. If that is the
| case, grinding could be viable. How hard is it to grind
| titanium?
| freeone3000 wrote:
| ...Very hard. It's titanium. Every work process has to be
| done with special carbide bits, at half speed, underwater.
| hinkley wrote:
| Tungsten carbide isn't it?
| BurningFrog wrote:
| "can influence" means either that science doesn't know yet how
| yttrium influences the alloy properties, or that the journalist
| didn't ask.
| hinkley wrote:
| Or the scientist read the room and decided being vague was
| the best option.
| robocat wrote:
| Grade 2 Sponge Titanium (USD/mt) = $6,087.03
|
| Yttrium: 28.9 USD/kg is 2890 USD/mt
|
| So the 1% Yttrium might be financially reasonable (assuming
| extra demand can be met). Prices from metal.com
| hinkley wrote:
| Sounds like a 'find a useful titanium/??/yttrium alloy'
| situation.
|
| I'm shocked that yttrium is dearer than smelted titanium.
| mmooss wrote:
| > this looks like trading one problem for another.
|
| That's not a valid analysis IMHO: Every choice trades one
| problem for another. At a minimum, the new problem is the cost
| in resources - time, money, personal energy (and in business,
| usually reputation risk and political capital) - but usually
| the cost is much more than that, especially when looking at
| alternative technical solutions. In advice to clients I always
| present the options as the minimum trade-off (it's my job to
| minimize it).
|
| More generally, the question is, which scenario of outcomes do
| you want? It could be the scenario with 1% yttrium is far
| better than the one with oxygen, or that the ytrrium scenario
| has a very different set of costs and benefits which make it
| valuable for certain needs that the oxygen scenario doesn't
| fulfill.
|
| But especially in this case, the report is about research &
| development. If there were no more problems to solve then it
| wouldn't be R&D. It's really self-defeating to criticize
| progress in R&D because some problems remain. 'We scored a
| goal, but that's just trading one problem for another - the
| other team has the ball!'
| LasEspuelas wrote:
| Everything is urgent: "There is thus an urgent need to develop a
| high-speed and efficient refining method to realize the mass
| production of low-cost Ti."
| duffpkg wrote:
| In "Skunk Works: A Personal Memoir of My Years at Lockheed",
| which is a great read, there is discussion of the incredibly
| difficult time they had setting up tooling for working with
| titanium. This remains largely true today. Making things at any
| scale in titanium, while controlling cost is very, very
| difficult. Even if the titanium itself is gotten very cheaply.
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