Annual world production
Yttrium oxide
Key material for efficiency and stabilityWhat is yttrium?
Yttrium is a silvery-metallic element, chemically closely related to the rare earths, and almost always occurs alongside them. Although it is not formally a lanthanide, in industrial practice it is usually classified among the heavy rare earths. Yttrium oxide is a versatile key material for modern high technologies:
It stabilizes high-performance materials, optimizes magnetic properties, and is indispensable in electronics, energy, and medical technologies. A particularly sensitive field of application is cancer therapy: the radioactive isotope yttrium-90 is used for targeted internal radiation of tumors, enabling high-precision medical applications.
Price development
The demand for yttrium oxide is growing with the expansion of high technologies, electronics, and energy engineering. At the same time, production remains highly concentrated and dependent on export controls. This leads to:
- long-term rising prices
- increasing dependence on a few suppliers
- a growing price gap between China and Europe
While yttrium in China is often still traded in the low double-digit US dollar range per kilogram, prices in Europe are already significantly higher – and the trend is rising.
Main areas of application
- For LEDs and screens
- Lasers (e.g., YAG)
- Medical implants
- Solid oxide fuel cells (SOFC)
- Aerospace
- High-temperature superconductors
- Radionuclide for cancer therapy
- Oxygen sensors
- For fuel rod cladding
Facts about yttrium oxide
Top 5 producers worldwide
Supply risk (EU) incl. refining
Recycling rate (EU)
Yttrium for the energy transition
As a stabilizer for zirconium oxide, yttrium oxide is indispensable for solid oxide fuel cells (SOFC). This technology is considered a key to efficient, climate-friendly energy conversion: yttrium-stabilized ceramics allow for high operating temperatures, a long service life, and high efficiency levels – technical prerequisites for economical fuel cells.
Yttrium also plays a role in the field of superconductivity: high-temperature superconductors such as yttrium barium copper oxide (YBCO) enable virtually lossless power transmission and are building blocks for future energy systems and powerful magnetic applications.
Mining and extraction
Today, the global supply of yttrium oxide comes almost entirely from China and Myanmar. There, yttrium is predominantly extracted from ion-adsorption clays and separated and refined via complex hydrometallurgical processes.
China controls both the mining and the majority of global refinery capacities – and thus the critical parts of the value chain. In Europe, there is currently no independent industrial processing of yttrium oxide.
Further deposits are found in xenotime placer deposits as well as in secondary enrichments in sands and sediments. These currently play only a minor role due to environmental regulations and export restrictions.
Growth markets
- Phosphors for LEDs and displays
- Laser technologies
- High-performance ceramics (e.g., medicine, industry)
- Solid oxide fuel cells and energy systems
- Superalloys for aerospace
- High-temperature superconductors
- Radionuclides for cancer therapy
- Oxygen and temperature sensors
- Catalysts for pharmaceutical processes
- Stabilizers for nuclear fuel cladding materials
Interesting fact:
Yttrium was named after the Swedish village of Ytterby – the same place where the elements terbium, erbium, and ytterbium were also discovered. No other single location has had so many elements of the periodic table named after it.
