Turkey should focus on $100 bln boron market
Boron has the potential to hold a much more important place in the Turkish economy in the future.
Turkey expects to see profits of TL 800 million from boron exports by the end of 2011, a figure that was only TL 230 million in 2002. Having the world’s largest boron reserves, with a share of 72 percent, Turkey has already sold the boron it is to produce in the next three years, Energy and Natural Resources Minister Taner Yildiz recently announced.
Yildiz also added that Turkey, which has increased its production capacity fivefold over the last eight years, has been the leader of the world boron market since 2005, selling boron chemicals and equivalent products to almost 90 countries. The amount of boron exported in 2002 was only 436,000 tons, whereas the figure is expected to reach 1.9 million tons this year. Meanwhile, Turkey aims to increase its production capacity first to 3.4 million tons in 2015, and then to 5.5 million tons in 2023, which will mark the 100th anniversary of the Turkish Republic. Another promising piece of news on the boron front came just last week from Science, Industry and Technology Minister Nihat Ergün, when he test drove a vehicle that runs on sodium borohydride fuel cells in Istanbul. The fuel cell, developed by the National Boron Research Institute (BOREN) and the Marmara Research Center of the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBITAK-MAM), consumes almost one kilogram of borohydride per 35 kilometers and can cover 100 kilometers at a maximum speed of 80 kilometers per hour.
Noting that Turkey has the largest boron reserves in the world, Ergün said at the test drive: “Why shouldn’t we utilize our potential in boron ore? Research and development concerning boron indicate that the mineral could be efficiently made use of in the automotive industry.” Borohydride fuel cells present several advantages in comparison to the lithium-ion batteries used in cars run by electricity: They have high performance and long life, occupy much less space, run fairly quietly and the gas emission from the engine is rather low. Ergün, pleased with the performance of the car during the test drive, also called on prospective entrepreneurs intending to produce a domestic automobile brand to carry out research and development work on sodium borohydride fuel cells. “The batteries to be developed could also be used by the defense industry. The army might choose to use these batteries, which store more energy and are lighter, over the heavy ones they currently use,” he said.
Turkey exports 97 percent of its boron production and controls 47 percent of the world market, the total size of which is $2 billion. Boron minerals are not exported as raw materials, but only after being transformed into boron chemicals ??? , Taner Yildiz, the minister of energy and natural resources, underlined in a statement he made to the Anatolia news agency. Yildiz, who sees boron as a strategic mineral for Turkey, is against boron being presented as the savior through which Turkey can pay off all its debt, but accepts that Turkey’s vast boron wealth has great potential for the country.
But Turan Batar, a professor in the faculty of mining at 9 Eylül University in Izmir, thinks that Turkey is only in the infancy stage and still has much to do when it comes to the boron industry. “There are two boron markets in the world. The first is a market worth $1.5-2 billion and includes items such as raw boron ore, boron concentrate, boron derivatives and Turkey’s boron trade is part of this market ,” he told Sunday’s Zaman.
The second market Batar speaks of contains high-tech products in industries such as textile, medicine and glass and is worth $100 billion. Turkey’s share in this giant market is almost zero. Batar, who sees Turkey’s high boron potential, said: “A profit of TL 800 million is not a big amount as far as boron is concerned. A single company earns $5 billion from boron products in the United States, importing most of the boron from Turkey. Turkey should focus on this market if it is to enjoy the benefits of its real potential in boron.” Being a scholar that has worked in this area for around 20 years, and granted that Turkey has made some giant steps in the area of boron since 2002, Batar is hopeful about the progress and adds that “there is no reason why Turkey should not get a share of a couple of billion dollars in the $100 billion market in five years’ time.”
In an effort to carry Turkey to the upper-league of the boron market, Eti Mine Works General Management, a state-owned firm and a major producer of boron in Turkey, announced recently that it is planning to establish a facility where boron-blended cement will be produced. The cement will be stronger and therefore more resistant to pressure. The firm is also the owner of another major discovery on boron. Orhan Yilmaz, the president of the firm, announced at the beginning of November that they had succeeded in eliminating, with the help of boron, 70 percent of the carbon dioxide emitted from factory chimneys. Work done in the laboratory has shown excellent results, and the firm is now planning to start pilot studies.
Another area where boron is used is agriculture. And food in the 21st century, which is now considered a strategic product, is nothing to take for granted with the world population surpassing 7 billion and countries striving to feed their populations. As in other industries, in agriculture also, the main function of boron in plants is to increase resistance. Land lacking a sufficient amount of boron is fed with boron fertilizer, which makes crops healthier and more resistant to insects and drought. The boron shortage in Turkey’s agricultural land is a significant issue. “Nearly a quarter of our agricultural land suffers from a lack of boron,” Professor Sait Gezgin from the faculty of agriculture at Selçuk University, Konya, told Sunday’s Zaman.
Pilot studies carried out in recent years have demonstrated that adding boron to crops lacking the mineral might increase yield by up to 30 percent, as in some types of wheat. In the case of garlic, the increase in yield is 22 percent, 15 percent for sugar beet and 30 percent for clover. A probable average increase by 15-20 percent in the total agricultural production would mean a great leap in Turkey’s agricultural income. Pilot studies have even led to a boron fertilizer, but there is still something essential missing in the equation as Gezgin confessed. “Turkish farmers do not yet know about boron fertilizer, and being a little too conservative, farmers are hesitant to try out the product.” To promote the boron fertilizer, BOREN and the General Directorate of Agricultural Research and Policy (TAGEM) will soon begin working on a project, with Gezgin as the coordinator, to carry out further research on how plants react to a boron deficiency and boron toxicity.
Boron minerals have more than 500 uses in various industries, such as ceramics, agriculture, detergents, fiber glass, cement, defense, wood, insulation and automotive sector. It is also used in jet and rocket fuels and in tank armor. Turkey, with a reserve of 885,000 tons of boron is the world’s leading producer, while the US or Russia (various sources have conflicting figures) come second with a reserve of only 80,000-100,000 tons. |
