Platinum Group Metals and Artificial Intelligence
Platinum Group Metals (PGMs) have been quietly supporting the modern industrial economy for decades, and supply chains and supply security are advantages that they have over other critical metals, making them uniquely ready to be geared into new technologies.
Platinum in hard drive disks
Platinum plays a critical role in enabling the growth of AI, as a key material in the hard disk drives (HDDs) used in cloud computing and AI data storage, where the main magnetic storage layer is a platinum alloy.
A few years ago, many expected solid state drives (SSDs) to displace hard disk drives completely, but the need for cheap, high-capacity storage in cloud computers has seen a resurgence of HDD demand after a multi-year slump.
Every time your Google or Apple account asks you to increase your storage that means gaining more access to cloud computing. This data is kept somewhere physically. Huge banks of information in global cloud storage require vast numbers of hard disk drives to keep their data written and re-written. Thin layers of platinum alloy used on the surface of the hard disk platters have played an essential role to make this happen.
A hard disk drive stores data magnetically on a rapidly spinning disk. In conventional perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) hard disk drives, ruthenium (another Platinum group metal) plays a structural role. In the latest generation of drives, known as heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR), a nano-scale laser briefly heats a tiny region of the spinning disc which allows the area to be more receptive to magnetic changes, allowing the magnet field of a voice coil on the hard disc drive to store data. Once cooled, the information or data bit is locked in place.
For conventional PMR, ruthenium acts as an important barrier layer, stopping the heat from spreading and isolating the magnetic layers giving additional recording layers in the same space. Without ruthenium, the industry would not have been able to scale HDD capacities from single-digit terabytes (TB) to 20TB.
However, HAMR represents a significant shift in the materials used inside hard disk drives. Unlike conventional ruthenium-containing PMR media, HAMR employs iron-platinum (FePt) alloys in its recording layer. These platinum-based magnetic materials offer extremely high thermal stability, which is essential when bits are written at nanoscale dimensions using heat.
HAMR media no longer requires the same ruthenium interlayers used in earlier drive generations. Instead, platinum steps up to become a critical material enabling further increases in areal density. This marks a transition in HDD materials rather than a continuation of the legacy PMR stack.
Today storage is in the range of 30-36 TB of data, which allows data centres to triple their storage density over conventional PMR 20 TB drives. Later this year we expect to see the rise of 40 TB HAMR based hard drives to help store more data for the AI wave. By 2030, Seagate expects to launch 100 TB HAMR drives, which will allow the creation and storage of data in real time. Total shipments by the end of this decade are expected to be 7.3 zettabyte (ZB), with 1 ZB equivalent to 1 billion terabytes. For those that remember floppy discs, 7.3 ZB has the same storage capacity as 660 trillion floppy discs!
Platinum in Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) fuel cells
Platinum is also supporting the AI revolution in a way you would not expect: as a key element in Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) fuel cells, a potential solution being trialled as backup power for data centres facing costly outages.
As AI-driven data generation accelerates, global data centres electricity use is projected to exceed 945 TWh annually by 2030. To put this number in context, this is more than Japan's total consumption today! With AI-optimized facilities significantly increasing demand, often outpacing grid capacity and risking costly outages.
Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) fuel cells are often promoted as a potential solution due to their rapid startup (<60 seconds), high reliability, and scalability from 200 kW to multi-MW, outperforming diesel generators in sustainability and maintenance according to Vertiv-Ballard. Companies like Microsoft and Ballad/Caterpillar have trialled PEM backup generators at 1,855 metres elevation and Microsoft/PlugPower have set up 3MW PEM fuel cell deployment for data centre power resilience.
Where PEM fuel cells are used, platinum is a key component due to its catalytic performance both for splitting hydrogen at the anode and reducing oxygen at the cathode. Platinum is unmatched in its efficiency, stability and rapid startup which is essential for reliable data centre back up power.
In parallel, solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) are increasingly viewed as a more viable long-duration and base-load option for power centres due to their higher electrical efficiency and fuel flexibility. While SOFCs stacks themselves contain little or no platinum, platinum group metals catalysts play an important role elsewhere where there is need upfront fuel processing and clean up and emissions treatment, ensuring that platinum continued to play a role in emerging data-centre energy infrastructure.
AI helping PGMs find new applications
PGMs help AI but AI can return the favour by accelerating PGM innovation in the chemical world. More and more we are seeing data models being built in the chemical world looking for new ways to develop science. Meta and Carnegic Mellon University have released OpenDAC to help develop cheaper direct air capture molecules to support carbon capture innovation. Companies like GreenCat leverage AI for combinatorial PGM rearrangements for new catalysts discovery. Enthalpic uses generative AI for the discovery of new materials and chemistry. Iris.ai helps screen chemical literature and patents to identify PGM alloys and material innovation for clients. Citrine Informatics has an AI Platform for materials R&D, optimise catalysts and materials for decarbonisation. Combinatorial rearrangements of precious metals would be an expensive real world experiment but with AI, we can rapidly rearrange these precious elements virtually at a fraction of the cost to find the next best catalysts and finding step change benefits for the decarbonisation industry.
AI helping find PGMs and refine them too!
AI can also help us find these elusive metals in the first place. Companies like Earth AI have trained their technology for remote sensing to pinpoint greenfield precious metals deposits in data poor region. Nornickel is using AI for safety monitoring and production optimisation at Kola MMC. Sibanye Stillwater is applying AI to help PGM operations for plant optimisation via its new AI policy.
As AI scales at dizzying heights, precious metals are instrumental in this transition, from data storage to power resilience and beyond. Fears of AI can be reframed as an opportunity to unlock unexpected new platforms for PGM demand going forward, by innovating a greener future.