The U.S. Department of Energy, Washington, has selected four projects to move on to a second phase of research in its effort to advance recovery of rare earth elements from coal and coal byproducts. DOE will invest $17.4 million to develop and test REE recovery systems originally selected and designed under Phase 1 of a prior funding opportunity announcement through DOE’s Office of Fossil Energy.
The projects, expected to be completed by 2020, fall under two areas of interest: (1) bench-scale technology to economically separate, extract, and concentrate mixed REEs from coal and coal byproducts, including aqueous effluents; and (2) pilot-scale technology to economically separate, extract, and concentrate mixed REEs from coal and coal byproduct solids.
The following two bench-scale projects were selected under area of interest 1: The University of North Dakota Institute for Energy Studies (Grand Forks) will use North Dakota subbituminous lignite coal and coal-related material as feedstock to test their REE recovery system.
West Virginia University Research Corp. (Morgantown.) will use acid mine drainage solids as a feedstock for recovery of REEs and other useful materials.
Two pilot scale-projects were selected under area of interest 2:
Physical Sciences Inc. (Andover, Mass.) will use coal fly ash physically processed (near Trapp, Kentucky) as their feedstock. The fly ash is a byproduct of combusting Central Appalachian bituminous coal in a power plant boiler.
The University of Kentucky Research Foundation (Lexington) will use two sources of coal preparation (coal washing) byproducts as feedstock for recovery of REEs.
