February 2021

• Silver Consumption in Global Automotive Sector

to Approach 90 Million Ounces By 2025
• SoCal’s Metrolink Trains Keep Passengers and Crew
Safe with New Silver/Copper Air Filter
• Silver Demand Forecast to Rise 11 Percent in 2021
• Recovering Silver from Industrial Waste Made
Easier with Plant Material
• Are Battery-Free Wearables Possible?
• A New Way to Harden Silver and Other Metals
• Silver Aids Faster and More Accurate Diagnosis of
Tumors and Other Growths
• Micromotors and Silver Join to Kill Bacteria

Silver Consumption in Global With modern cars using more silver than ever in their
advanced technology components, the worldwide
automotive sector could need nearly 90 million ounces
Automotive Sector to Approach 90 (Moz) annually of the metal by 2025, according to a
recently-published report by the Silver Institute.
Million Ounces By 2025; In four years, silver consumption in the automotive
sector should rival that of the photovoltaic industry,
Should Challenge Silver Usage in forecast to reach 98 Moz in 2025, and currently the
Photovoltaic Industry largest application of global industrial silver demand,
according to the report Silver’s Growing Role in the
Automotive Industry, produced on behalf of the Silver
Institute by Metals Focus, an independent precious metals
consultancy.
The report, part of the Silver Institute’s series of Market
Trend Reports, examines trends in automotive production,
including the growth and evolution of hybrid and battery
electric vehicles. It also addresses transportation policies
that favor vehicle electrification in some of the world’s
most important vehicle markets.
Highlights of the report include:
• Silver’s widespread use in automobiles reflects its
superior electrical properties, as well as its excellent
oxide resistance and durability under harsh operating
environments;
• Silver is used extensively in vehicle electrical control
units that manage a wide range of functions in the
engine and main cabin. These functions include
infotainment systems, navigation systems, electric
power steering, and safety features, such as airbag
deployment systems, automatic braking, security and
Silver is used in the vast majority of automobile devices like the ones shown here. driver alertness systems;
• Average vehicle silver usage, which is currently
estimated at 15-28 grams (g) per internal combustion
engine (ICE) light vehicle, has been rising over
the past few decades. In hybrid vehicles, silver use

continued on page 2
continued from page 1

is higher at around 18-34g per light vehicle, while battery electric

Silver Demand Forecast to
vehicles (BEVs) consume about 25-50g of silver per vehicle. Rise 11 Percent in 2021;
• The move to autonomous driving should lead to an escalation of
vehicle complexity, requiring even more silver consumption. Silver Expected to Reach Eight-Year
automotive demand this year is projected to be 61 million ounces.
• Ancillary services that require silver are also increasing, including
High of 1.025 Billion Ounces
charging stations and charging points for electric vehicles; and Led by industrial use and physical silver investment,
global silver demand is projected to achieve an eight-
• The acceptance of BEVs is gaining momentum as an increasing number year high of 1.025 billion ounces in 2021, according
of countries adopt policies that support the BEV industry. to an analysis published by the Silver Institute on
To download a copy of the report, please click here. February 10.
Strong investment demand is expected to push silver
prices higher in 2021. Physical investment, which
covers silver bullion coin and bar purchases, is expected
SoCal’s Metrolink Trains Keep to achieve a six-year high in 2021 of 257 million
ounces (Moz), as investors continue to add silver to
Passengers and Crew Safe with their investment holdings. Already this year, holdings
in exchange traded products reached a record level on
New Silver/Copper Air Filter February 3 of 1.18 billion ounces. One caveat: If the
global economic recovery from the pandemic proves to
Metrolink -- Southern California’s regional passenger train service -- has be slower than expected, this could weigh on base metal
added silver and copper-based antimicrobial filters to its train cars to keep prices, which could, in turn, encourage investors to
passengers and train employees safe from airborne germs. reduce their exposure to silver.
The PuraShield air filters from Purafil not only capture the microbes, but the Industrial demand is projected to post a four-year high
company’s proprietary antimicrobial technology employs silver and copper in 2021 of 510 Moz, a 9 percent increase over 2020
ions to attack and destroy the bacteria. The company claims that the filters figures. Demand from the electrical and electronics
screen out 99.99% of the staphylococcus bacteria, 99.91% of the H1N1 sector is poised to account for the bulk of these gains.
virus, 99.96% of E. Coli bacteria and 99.58% of the SARS virus.  With the growing penetration of 5G technology in
“With every passing day, we learn more about ways to prevent the spread consumer electronics this sector is expected to drive
of COVID-19 and take necessary steps to keep our riders and employees strong gains for silver offtake, with a 7 percent increase
safe aboard our trains,” said Metrolink Board Chair Brian Humphrey in a over 2020 to 300 Moz for silver’s use in the sector.
prepared statement. “Understanding the airborne nature of COVID-19, we The photovoltaic (PV) sector staged a strong recovery
installed new state-of-the-art air filters that improve the air flow aboard our in the second half of 2020, and this momentum should
trains and destroy 99.9% of impurities. Together with enhanced cleaning, carry through 2021. The global total for the sector is
physical distancing and our face mask requirement, this new step reduces forecast at 105 Moz in 2021, overcoming the losses
the exposure risk of infection.” sustained last year. Although silver loadings continue
The new filters are part of Metrolink’s Heating, Ventilation, and Air to drift lower, the sector will benefit from a growing
Conditioning (HVAC) system, which is itself another protective layer. number of countries that are installing new PV
Intake vents draw in outside air, send it through the HVAC system, then capacity. Silver’s use in the automotive market should
distribute the filtered and cleaned air into the cars. Through this process, the also rebound strongly in 2021, to just over 60 Moz,
filters screen out and kill not only viral and bacterial particles, but biological benefiting from the growing electrification of vehicles.
and atmosphere odors, providing a safer experience for riders. Global jewelry demand is forecast to rebound to 174
Moz but remain below pre-COVID levels. To a large
extent, this reflects only a modest recovery in India,
where demand will be affected by high and volatile
rupee silver prices. A similar outcome emerges in
silverware, which is dominated by the Indian market.
Even though total silverware fabrication is predicted
to achieve a double-digit percentage gain this
year, reaching 45 Moz, the global total will remain
considerably short of 2019 levels because of the
challenges in India.
Metals Focus, the respected global precious metals
METROLINK

research consultancy, contributed to this analysis.  The

firm will research and produce the Silver Institute’s
annual report on the international silver market, World
Southern California Metrolink train riders are being protected from airborne bacteria and Silver Survey 2021, which will be released on April 22.
viruses by silver/copper-based filters in the ventilation systems.
Recovering Silver from Industrial Are Battery-Free Wearables
Waste Made Easier with Plant Possible?
Material What if wearables could be powered by electricity generated
by the body’s own heat?
Scientists at Kanazawa University in Japan have developed a method
Researchers at the Korea Institute of Science and Technology
for extracting silver and other metals from acidic wastewater using
(KIST) are studying whether an ordinary thermocouple --
an environmentally-friendly method that involves cellulose, the main
two different pieces of metal that generate electricity when
building block of green plants.
sandwiched together in the presence of heat -- could generate
The technique involves letting extremely small particles of cellulose enough electrical energy to operate a wearable device like
adsorb the acidic liquid waste -- at room temperature -- which is heart rate or blood pressure monitors without the need for
carrying the metals. Once adsorbed, the cellulose carrier is burned and batteries.
the silver recovered. Not only is the adsorption process straightforward
Thermocouples are common in devices like fire alarms or
but it is relatively fast, about an hour at designated acidic levels, the
hot water pipe sensors, because they generate an electrical
researchers reported.
signal at dangerously high temperatures but not at lower
Once the cellulose-containing silver is incinerated, silver in powder temperatures.
form is left. By increasing the oven temperature, the powder then
That’s where silver comes in.
is converted into silver pellets. No other chemicals are needed. An
analysis of the final metal pellets shows that they are pure silver and not Because of silver’s low electrical conductivity, ability to
silver-oxide. transfer heat with low loss, and flexibility, the researchers
are experimenting with connecting a high-performance
“We removed nearly all of the silver … from real industrial waste
thermoelectric device to a stretchable base composed of silver
samples,” said lead author of the published study Foni Biswas in a
nanowires. The researchers showed that the device could be
prepared statement. “Obtaining pure and elemental metals proceeded as
printed and placed onto the skin where its flexibility allowed
smoothly as in our trial runs.”
maximum contact to body heat. When touching human skin, 7
Aside from silver, other metals from the industrial waste were microwatts per square centimeter of electricity was generated
extracted. Palladium, copper and lead were among the 11 metals from body temperature only.
recovered using this process with copper and lead removed with the
Seungjun Chung, one of the study’s authors, said: “Going
most ease, according to the researchers.
forward, we will develop a flexible thermoelectric platform
The method can be scaled up for commercial applications. The study that can operate wearables with only body temperature…
stated: “… the excellent performance (extraction rate of about 99%) Our research findings are significant in that the functional
of [specially-modified cellulose] towards the recovery of silver and composite material, thermoelectric device platform, and high-
palladium from actual waste solutions indicates the potential for the yield automated process developed in this study will be able to
application of the process at a larger scale.” contribute to the commercialization of battery-free wearables
in the future.”
CHEMICAL ENGINEERING JOURNAL

By using extremely small particles of cellulose in wastewater, scientists have

extracted 11 different metals including silver, copper and lead, as well as
palladium.
A New Way to Harden Silver Silver Aids Faster and More
and Other Metals Accurate Diagnosis of Tumors
For centuries, metalworkers have hardened metals by bending, and Other Growths
twisting, hammering and running them between rollers. These
traditional methods work because they break the metal’s microscopic Doctors are always seeking more effective and less invasive
grain structure and realign it with smaller grains that are inherently ways to identify tumors and other abnormalities inside patients.
harder. The most common method is through radiology, such as X-rays
and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), after injecting dyes
Now, scientists at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island,
into the body that help illuminate a specific area. Some patients
have found a new way to harden metals, including silver, by
cannot tolerate the dyes, however, so radiologists resort to
smashing together nanoclusters of the metal.  Nanoclusters are
inserting non-toxic, semiconductor nanoparticles that glow
groups of a small number of atoms, in the tens at most, that have the
under ultraviolet (UV) light, a property known as luminescence.
same properties as their larger counterparts. When the Brown team
Unfortunately, these nanoparticles suffer two drawbacks: they
impacted together individual metal nanoclusters to form solid, larger
are not very bright nor does their luminescence last long enough
hunks they found that the resulting metal was up to four times harder
for study.
than the naturally-occurring metal.
Silver offers a solution. To make nanoparticles brighter and
“Hammering and other hardening methods are all top-down ways
last longer, a team of scientists from the Tokyo Institute of
of altering grain structure, and it’s very hard to control the grain
Technology ‘doped’ a platinum thiolate complex (a type of
size you end up with,” said Ou Chen, an assistant professor of
metal complex that contains sulfur) with silver that increases
chemistry at Brown and corresponding author of the new research, in
photoluminescence by 18 times.
a public statement. “What we’ve done is create nanoparticle building
blocks that fuse together when you squeeze them. This way we can Why does it work?
have uniform grain sizes that can be precisely tuned for enhanced The scientists found that when energized with UV light, the
properties.” structure is kept stable and intact by the silver ions, thus leading
Not only were the metals harder, but in the case of silver, in to strong photoluminescence. “This could be because the size
particular, the metal’s exceptional reflective and electrical of the silver ion and the cavity of the platinum thiolate ring are
conductivity properties remained the same. This is especially a good match and the orbitals are in good alignment,” said team
important for silver, because it is too soft for some industrial leader Prof. Takane Imaoka. He added: “The silver ion acts as a
applications where its other properties would be welcomed. These template to maintain the highly-ordered structure of the tiara-like
applications could include, for example, a silver switch that is complex, thereby enormously enhancing its phosphorescence.”
subject to extreme wear and tear or high weight loads in industrial Also, the silver-doped structure stayed intact longer than the
equipment. non-doped structure, the team noted in their study.
Chen has patented the technique. “We think there’s a lot of potential Further studies will explore how to produce even brighter
here, both for industry and the scientific research community,” nanoparticles which would enable doctors to identify smaller
he said. tumors and other abnormalities within the body sooner and with
more accuracy.
BROWN UNIVERSITY

Professor Ou Chen was awarded an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Fellowship

for 2020, an honor given to outstanding early-career researchers.
Micromotors and Silver Join to Kill Bacteria
Micromotors -- corkscrew-shaped devices that are about a hundred micrometers long and propelled by nearby magnets -- show great promise in
delivering drugs inside the body as well as scooping up pollutants in wastewater.
Although still in the trial phase, engineers from the Chinese University of Hong Kong and Huazhong University of Science and Technology
have been able to produce these micromotors from graphene, a material that is derived from carbon atoms fashioned in a particular structure
that makes it extremely light yet more than 200 times stronger than steel. For its weight, it is reportedly the strongest material ever invented.
These engineers have not only produced these motors from graphene but have done so in a cheap and easily scaled-up fashion able to make
hundreds in minutes.
Because graphene easily attaches to other molecules -- aided by a high surface area -- it is ideal for collecting microscopic pollutants as well as
bacteria that may be harmful to humans. (See Micromotors Lure, Trap and Destroy Bacteria with Silver Ions, February 2020 Silver News.)
To that end, the engineers have attached silver ions to the micromotors to test their ability to destroy bacteria. In the laboratory, stationary silver
micromotors killed deadly E. coli bacteria in a petri dish. When the micromotors were moved around by magnetic fields, they were even more
effective.
Although explored theoretically in 1947, graphene was first explicitly produced and identified in 2004 by the team of Andre
Geim and Konstantin Novoselov who shared the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics for their work.

Click the image to watch a video on micromotors in action.

1400 I Street, NW, Suite 550

Washington, DC 20005
T 202.835 0185
www.silverinstitute.org F 202.835 0155
@SilverInstitute on Twitter