What is Columbite Tantalite and how is it used?

Coltan is the industrial name for columbite– tantalite, a dull black metallic mineral from which the elements niobium (formerly “columbium”) and tantalum are extracted. The niobium-dominant mineral is columbite, hence the “col” half of the term. The mineral concentrates dominated by tantalum are referred to as tantalite.

Tantalum from coltan is used to manufacture electronic capacitors, used in consumer electronics products such as cell phones, DVD players, video game systems and computers.

Coltan Production and supply

Approximately 71% of global tantalum supply in 2008 was met by newly mined product, 20% from recycling, and the remainder from tin slag and inventory.

Tantalum minerals are mined in Democratic Republic of Congo, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Ethiopia, Rwanda and Mozambique.  Colubite Tantalite is also produced in Thailand and Malaysia as a by-product of tin mining and smelting.

Potential future mines, in descending order of magnitude, are being explored in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Greenland, China, Mozambique, Canada, Australia, the United States, Finland, Afghanistan, and Brazil. A significant reserve of coltan was discovered in 2009 in western Venezuela.

In 2009 the Colombian government announced coltan reserves had been found in Colombia’s eastern provinces.

Columbite Tantalite use and demand

Coltan or Columbite Tantalite is used primarily for the production of tantalum capacitors, used in many electronic devices.

It is also used in high temperature alloys for air and land based turbines. The upsurge in electronic products over the past decade resulted in a peak in late 2000 with inflated high demand and price increases for the mineral which lasted a few months. In 2005 the price was still down at early 2000 levels.

The United States Geological Survey estimates that the tantalum production capacity could meet global demand, which is growing at four per cent annually, up until the year 2013.

 

Coltan for Sony

Toward Freedom claims that the 2000 launch of the Sony PlayStation 2 required a large increase in production of tantalum electrolytic capacitors, which greatly increased the world price of the powder from $49/pound to a $275/pound, resulting in accelerated mining of the Congolese hills containing coltan. Sales of computers, mobile phones, and DVD players spiked around this same time. Sony claims it has discontinued its use of tantalum acquired from the Congo, and sourced it from a variety of mines in several different countries. Statistical analysis shows it to be nearly inconceivable that Sony made all its PlayStations without using Congolese coltan.