A 2.34 billion-metric-ton deposit of granite containing substantial amounts of rare earth elements in the rugged mountains and canyons of southern Wyoming is said to be one of the largest strikes in the United States.
And a Colorado company is playing a key role in its development, which offers both significant economic and national security implications.
Lakewood-based Wyoming Rare USA Inc., a subsidiary of American Rare Earths Limited, has been exploring and developing the Cowboy State Mine some 25 miles southwest of Wheatland since 2020.
Rare earth elements are used in a vast array of products — from fighter jets and missiles to cell phones and automobiles. Perhaps the most frequent use is that of neodymium, which is used in making high-strength magnets, including those used in wind turbine generators.
Just as notably, the sheer size of the deposit and its concentration of rare earth elements is of strategic importance to the U.S. precisely because it is a valuable domestic economic resource, according to Mel Sanderson, director at Wyoming Rare and its parent company.
Sanderson told The Denver Gazette that the deposit could deliver as much as 200 million metric tons of materials that would be available for manufacturing over its lifetime.
In a company scoping study, the mine has been estimated to annually produce (in metric tons) 1,529 mt of neodymium-praseodymium oxide (NdPr), 17 mt of terbium oxide, 91 mt of dysprosium oxide, 383 mt of Samarium-Europium-Gadolinium concentrate, and 1,486 mt of lanthanum carbonate, or more than 3,506 mt of REE.
“It’s one of the largest deposits of rare earth elements in the nation,” Joe Evers, president of Wyoming Rare told The Denver Gazette. “And what we’re really excited about from a strategic advantage is we have the ability to start a mine on wholly owned land from the state of Wyoming.”
This, said Evers, sidesteps the often decades-long permitting process for mining on federal lands. He expects mining to begin in three to five years.
A core sample from the Wyoming Rare Inc. Cowboy State Mine in southern Wyoming.
Courtesy of Wyoming Rare Inc.
“It’s a clear cut, singular resource of enormous national security potential to this country,” Sanderson said.
Sanderson said the find is also highly strategic resource for several reasons. Notably, she said, Wyoming has a track record as an energy supplier to the United States.
“With the transition in place that is seeing a gradual decline in coal and a gradual rise in green energy, developing the rare earth resources of the state of Wyoming is absolutely key,” she said. “But, secondly, it allows Wyoming to keep a trained workforce of highly skilled mining professionals employed in the state. They’re not going to have to leave and look elsewhere. Thirdly, it maintains the funding for educational opportunities in Wyoming.”
China’s grip
Sanderson said the current global demand is “relatively depressed” because China holds 90% market dominance, and the country has long-term contracts in place with all of the key end users.
“So, for companies like ours, and many others in the West that are trying to enter the market — which is a narrow spectrum of the mining industry to begin with — it’s hard,” she added.
China’s global dominance in the REE market isn’t just of mining the elements — China also conducts the bulk of the processing and production of end-user products, such as high-strength magnets, Sanderson noted. China’s grip on both supply of raw materials and of the manufacturing technology is so tight that at present, domestic users of REE must send the raw materials to China to have them incorporated in their products, which are then shipped back.
According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, China controls more than 85% of REE processing capacity, 60% of raw materials mining, and more than 90% of production of permanent magnets.
Production of rare earth elements in the U.S. in 2023 was about 43,000 tons, and global production was estimated at 350,000 tons, according to the United States Geological Survey. Reserves in North America are estimated at 3.6 million tons in the United States and more than 14 million tons in Canada, according to the 2024 USGS Mineral Commodity Summary.
Since the beginning of the push for decarbonization, which is driving the need for more and more products containing REE, the Biden administration has been trying to foster development of both domestic sources and domestic manufacturing of REE products to bypass China.
“Over the past several decades, China has cornered the market for processing and refining of key critical minerals, leaving the U.S. and our allies and partners vulnerable to supply chain shocks and undermining economic and national security,” said a Sept. 20 White House fact sheet.
Asked if the U.S. could compete with China in the REE marketplace, Geoffrey Hill, American Rare Earths Limited director and one of its founders said, “Competitive with China is an interesting concept. They don’t measure accounting like we do. They don’t need to make a profit. So, do I think we can produce rare earths on a comparable basis to the China? Yes, I do, but it may not be profitable.”
“You have to go back to the 50s and the 60s, when the U.S. desperately needed uranium for plutonium. They didn’t worry about whether it was commercial or not. The government subsidized it to make sure it works,” Hill added. “Rare earth is not that much different because the need for rare earth strategically, particularly in defense issues, is so significant. And relying on China is so dangerous.”
In late September, the Export-Import Bank of the United States issued a non-binding Letter of Interest to provide Wyoming Rare with up to $456 million in debt financing to support construction and operations at the mine.
American Rare Earths also recently received its first reimbursement from the Wyoming Energy Authority (WEA) grant program of just over $304,000.
“We are excited to receive this first reimbursement, which represents a crucial step in executing our plans,” said Chris Gibbs, American Rare Earths Limited CEO in a release. “This funding will significantly aid our efforts to de-risk the Cowboy State Mine and help us achieve our 2025 goals.”
The Red Mountain pluton
The geologic formation involved is called the Red Mountain pluton, a granitic formation 3 to 4 miles across that was super-heated and made its way to the surface eons ago. Evers said the rock is remarkably homogenous, as well, all the way down to at least 1,000 feet, and possibly farther.
“So, it is somewhat like a big plug, a big mushroom that we’ve been able to identify,” Evers said. “That’s one of the things that’s exciting as we’ve drilled down. The deepest holes that we’ve drilled onsite to date are 300 meters and we’re still seeing that homogenous mineralization come through at those depths.”
The Cowboy State Mine itself covers about 200 to 240 acres of the 8,000-acre pluton. Evers says the first phase of the mine could easily go down more than a thousand feet and could last 20 years or more.
“Another important point to keep in mind is the 2.4 billion that Joe mentioned,” Sanderson said. “That’s on only 25% of the land that we have in our concession. So, we have before us a big task to continue exploration activities and continue refining and defining what we’ve got and how much we’ve got.”
The deposit was discovered by geologists because parts of it are exposed at the surface. They were able to pick up rocks and analyze them for REE without having to drill test holes. A drilling program followed to map out the highest concentrations of ore, and exploratory drilling will continue as the mine is developed.
“Geologists did a lot of field work and a lot of chip samples and so forth because parts of this deposit are exposed don’t even require us to drill down,” Evers said. “So, they were able to home in on a geographic area within our concession that was presenting the most concentrated and which is an example of the mineralogy. And that footprint is likely to be more like 200 to 240 acres, which, by mining standards, is relatively a compact footprint. But based on the base case production that we outlined in our scoping study, we think there’s a couple of decades of mine life at that first phase.”
Sanderson talked about issues of environmental protection that most mines run up against. While there are inevitable impacts, she pointed out that critical minerals like these are necessarily mined where they are found, but that careful operation doesn’t have to cause unnecessary harm to the environment.
“Let me add to that by saying that, in the United States, generally, there’s a public misperception that mining companies don’t care about the environment, and that they’re getting away with a lot of environmental offenses,” Sanderson said. “The reality couldn’t be further from the truth. Mining companies do care about the environment in part because that environment also includes people.”
She added: “And if you’re going to be a good neighbor for 20, 50 or a hundred years as mining companies are, you don’t want to frankly piss off your neighbors. So, you don’t want to be the element that’s out there driving away all of the game or that’s polluting the air or that’s polluting the water.”
Sanderson said the mining industry in the U.S., aside from the European Union, is the most highly regulated industry in the world. She said mine operating in the U.S. will, on a monthly basis, host a minimum of two visits from different inspectors from different regulatory agencies of the U.S. government.
Sanderson also said that the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality is every bit as rigorous in the standards that it sets to protect the state’s natural resources — and in ensuring that those parameters are adhere to.
“We have absolutely got to make sure that projects like this one succeed, because, otherwise, the U.S. will fail both in its economic transformation and most importantly, it will fail to secure the future for our country,” Sanderson said.
“We will lose our national security,” she added.
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Publish date : 2024-10-27 18:20:00
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