Whoops, you're totally right- got my Chinese metals mixed up. 75% of US tellurium comes from China, and I must have gotten cross-contaminated. > The cadmium d

Whoops, you're totally right- got my Chinese metals mixed up. 75% of US tellurium comes from China, and I must have gotten cross-contaminated. > The cadmium doesn't leak out of the panel any more than arsenic leaks out of cell phone power amplifiers. The actual cells are perfectly safe but the mining and manufacturing process is not. The extremely lax controls in China 20+ years ago aren't representative of the present, but they did do terrible damage and mining cadmium will always cause contamination. > NiMH batteries do contain mixed rare earth elements (mostly lanthanum), but the particular elements used are fairly abundant. Yes! That's what I had been thinking of, besides magnets obviously. Lanthanum is also notable in that it's used to make gasoline, along with cerium.