Hardware to Save a Planet
At the Threshold of Greener and Cheaper Electric Motors for EVs with Robert Sansone, Young Innovator and Winner of the Regeneron ISEF Award
December 8, 2022
In this episode of Hardware to Save a Planet, Dylan is joined by Robert Sansone, a young innovator, a high school student, and the winner of the prestigious Regeneron ISEF award for best innovation by a high school student. Robert shares his journey of inventing a greener electric motor for electric vehicles that don’t use rare earth magnets.
In this episode of Hardware to Save a Planet, Dylan is joined by Robert Sansone, a young innovator, a high school student, and the winner of the prestigious Regeneron ISEF award for best innovation by a high school student. Robert shares his journey of inventing a greener electric motor for electric vehicles that don’t use rare earth magnets.

Electric motors in all EVs use magnets made from rare earth materials like Neodymium. These elements are found next to highly radioactive materials like Uranium and Thorium, and purifying them creates a highly toxic effluent. Refining rare earth elements into magnets is expensive, thereby increasing the electric motor's cost. Robert is developing an electric motor that uses conventional magnets while overcoming the torque limitation of using conventional magnets. 

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Previous guests include: Peter Reinhardt of Charm Industrial, Carlos Araque of Quaise, Noah McQueen of Heirloom, Areeb Malik of Glacier, Jeff Satwicz of Bigbelly, Abe Schneider of Natel Energy, Insiya Jafferjee of Shellworks, Paul Gross of Remora, Erika Boeing of Accelerate Wind and Daniel Betts of Blue Frontier.

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