BY: Alberto Bollero - Advanced Technologies and Micro Systems, Corporate Sector Research and Advance Engineering - Robert Bosch Campus, Stuttgart (Germany)

When: May, 17 - 12PM

Where: Salón de Actos, ICMM

Abstract: A strong international effort is taking place to enable achieving electrification to address urgent environmental issues. With this purpose, academia, research institutes and industry are joining forces to make possible successful development and implementation of well-defined strategies. Decisive factors that come together to succeed in this goal are performance, procurement of a sustainable supply of raw materials, low carbon emissions, circularity, and cost to make affordable the technology to citizens. Magnetic materials are at the core of this development as key drivers of our present and future technology [1]. 

Diversification in the field of permanent magnets may contribute to solve open challenges (namely, rare earths-related geopolitical and environmental issues) while enriching the scientific knowledge of existing, long-time-forgotten, and new phases. A short review will be done on advances done in the field of permanent magnets. Hard hexaferrites and L10-MnAlC will be used as example cases of rare earth-free magnetic materials with the potential to improve further its performance through morphological and microstructural modification [2]. 

But diversification is not a concept to be used for free and must start by a proper match between understanding and development of materials and the technical requirements of the target application. Electric motors make a perfect example of hard magnetic (permanent magnets) and soft magnetic (electrical steel) materials combined in a single machine. Power density and machine efficiency are determined by magnetic saturation and magnetic losses of e-steel material under dynamic operation conditions. A good understanding of the interplay between the major materials present in e-drives is a key factor to succeed in electrification [3].

[1]     A. Kuokkanen et al., European Climate Neutral Industry Competitiveness Scoreboard (CINDECS) - Annual Report 2022, Publications Office of the European Union (2022).

[2]     A. Bollero and E.M. Palmero, Recent advances in hard - ferrite magnets, in J.J. Croat and J. Ormerod (eds.) Modern Permanent Magnets, pp. 65-112, Elsevier (2022).

[3]     www.bosch.com/research