Australia's Lynas Rare Earths has won a $120mn contract from the US Defense Department (DoD) to build a heavy rare earth separation plant in the US.
Lynas will build the plant in Texas on the same site as a proposed light rare earth separation plant. The cost of construction of the heavy rare earth plant is fully covered by the $120mn contract funded by the US DoD Industrial Base Analysis and Sustainment programme. Lynas completed a phase I project for design and engineering work in the second quarter of last year. But the latest funding marks a big step-up from the phase I award, which was estimated at a couple of million dollars.
Lynas will supply mixed rare earth carbonate feedstock from its Mt Weld mine in Western Australia but also plans to work with third-party suppliers. Mt Weld currently supplies around 15pc of global supply of light rare earths neodymium and praseodymium oxide needed for high-performance neodymium iron boron (NdFeB) magnets. But the deposit also contains some heavy rare earths and Lynas estimates that it could hold around 6,600t of heavy rare earth dysprosium.
The joint project to build a light rare earth separation plant in the US was announced at the start of last year. The cost will be split 50:50 between Lynas and the DoD. DoD funding, initially estimated at $30mn, is provided under the US Title III Defence Production Act.
This latest development marks the second US government sponsored project to build separation capacity for heavy rare earths in the US.
In February the DoD awarded a $35mn contract to US mining firm MP Materials to build a a processing and separation capacity for heavy rare earths. It will be located at the site of MP Materials' Mountain Pass light rare earth mine in California and be designed to accept third-party feed. Mountain Pass provides around 10-15pc of global supply of light rare earth oxides contained in unseparated concentrate. MP has received US funding and invested heavily in the development of processing capacity for light rare earths at Mountain Pass. In May the company said it expects the light rare earth separation capacity to be mechanically complete by year-end and hit run rate normalised production in 2023.
Lynas owns and operates a large light rare earth separation plant in Malaysia with a capacity of 26,000 t/yr of rare earth oxides and 7,200 t/yr of neodymium-praseodymium oxide.
The US currently has no operating, commercial-scale capacity for separating light or heavy rare earths that are critical inputs for high-performance neodymium iron boron magnets (NdFeB) used in electric vehicle motors, wind turbines and consumer electronics. Heavy rare earths dysprosium and to a lesser extent terbium are added in small quantities to improve magnet performance at higher temperatures.
By Caroline Messecar
