U.S. mining operations discarding rare minerals at center of trade talks

By Brett Rowland
The Center Square

U.S. mining operations are discarding valuable minerals needed for everything from electric vehicles to missile defense systems that could reduce U.S. dependence on foreign nations.

Researchers at the Colorado School of Mines said that if U.S. companies could recover 1% of what is wasted, the U.S. would be less reliant on foreign sources. And 90% recovery of by-products from existing domestic metal mining operations “could meet nearly all U.S critical mineral needs,” according to the study, which was recently published in the journal “Science.”

Minerals, such as cobalt, lithium, gallium and rare earth elements like neodymium and yttrium, are being discarded as tailings – or waste products – of other mineral streams like gold and zinc, said Elizabeth Holley, associate professor of mining engineering at Colorado School of Mines and lead author of the paper.

“The challenge lies in recovery,” she said. “It’s like getting salt out of bread dough – we need to do a lot more research, development and policy to make the recovery of these critical minerals economically feasible.”

The study estimated critical minerals being mined and processed every year at U.S. metal mines but not being recovered. Rather, the minerals wind up as discarded tailings that must be stored and monitored to prevent environmental contamination.

“This is a brand-new view of ‘low hanging fruit’ – we show where each critical mineral exists and the sites at which even 1% recovery of a particular critical mineral could make a huge difference, in many cases dramatically reducing or even eliminating the need to import that mineral,” Holley said.

The study comes as President Donald Trump looks to reorder global trade and pushes China to step up release of rare earth minerals needed for advanced manufacturing.

Trump, earlier this year, threatened to raise tariffs even further on China if officials didn’t release such minerals for export, underscoring their importance to the U.S. economy.

The study looked at a total of 70 elements used in applications ranging from consumer electronics like cell phones to medical devices to satellites to renewable energy to fighter jets and found that unrecovered byproducts from other U.S. mines could meet the demand for all but two: Platinum and palladium.