The Dynamo of Neodymium: How the U.S. is Compelled to Pursue Rare Earth Element Supply Chain at Home
Rare earth elements are critical parts of the industrial supply chain and considered particularly vital to energy transition technologies such as battery storage, hydrogen fuel cells, electric and hybrid vehicles.
Sustaining that flow of rare earth elements to North America is challenging given that a majority of the mining and supply chain centers have been controlled overseas in Asia. U.S. energy transition firms are reshoring many manufacturing capabilities back to the U.S. but need a steady, easily delivered supply of critical elements as components.
To that end, last month the U.S. Department of Energy awarded investments totaling $17 million for 14 projects nationwide, mainly in university and laboratory research of utilizing critical materials.
Projects recovering and recycling critical materials from scrap and post-consumer products attracted $2.78 million of that DOE funding. Both research projects are based in Texas, with El Paso’s Infinite Elements gaining $1.5 million and Texas A&M University receiving $1.28 million.
All of the projects are coordinated through DOE’s Critical Materials Collaborative.
See Complete List of DOE Awardees
“DOE is helping reduce the nation’s dependence on foreign supply chains through innovative solutions that will tap domestic sources of the critical materials needed for next-generation technologies,” Energy Secretary Jennifer M. Granholm said in a statement announcing the December awards. “These investments—part of our industrial strategy—will keep America’s growing manufacturing industry competitive while delivering economic benefits to communities nationwide.”
Why REEs are Critical
Rare earth elements include 17 soft metals such as scandium, yttrium, lanthanum, neodymium, promethium, cerium, thulium, erbium and lutetium, among others. Some of the elements are key components to magnets which are integral to electric motor and power generation, while some are used in solid oxide fuel cells and control rods for nuclear reactors.
China held sway over the rare earth mining supply chain in recent decades, but political, economic and environmental trends are calling U.S. leaders to reposition their nation as a supplier. In fact, the U.S. hopes to secure a stable supply chain of the elements closer to home by 2027, Assistant U.S. Secretary of Defense Laura Taylor-Kale told a mining industry conference in Australia, according to Reuters.
The Texas A&M work is focused on developing a sustainable method for recovering and repurposing rare earth elements from electronic waste.
Other entities selected for the DOE critical materials award included the University of Texas-Arlington, Ames National Laboratory, ABB, Niron Magnetics, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Summit Nanotech and University of North Dakota.
In November 2023, mining developer Ramaco Resources reportedly discovered potentially vast amounts of rare earth and magnet materials at the former coal-mining Brook Mine property in Sheridan, Wyoming. One year later, the company touted those reserves and recovery as economically feasible.
