Wyoming’s first new coal mine in decades to extract rare earths

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — The developer of what would be the first new coal mine in Wyoming in decades plans to process the fossil fuel to extract hard-to-get metals that are crucial for tech products and military hardware.

Energy Secretary Chris Wright, former West Virginia U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon, and Wyoming’s congressional delegation are on the VIP list for a groundbreaking ceremony Friday at the Ramaco Resources, Inc., Brook Mine outside Ranchester in far northern Wyoming.

Rare earth elements are a family of 17 metallic elements with unusual properties that make them useful for specific applications. Neodymium and dysprosium are used in the permanent magnets of wind turbines, lanthanum in electric and hybrid car batteries.

Yttrium and terbium have critical military uses, including in targeting devices.

China supplies almost 90% of the world’s rare earths. Concern about continued access to the substances has been a focus of recent negotiations between China and the U.S., and led the Trump administration to try to encourage more production domestically.

Rare earths aren’t especially rare but so scattered they are difficult to bring together in useful quantities. Currently the only U.S. rare earths mine is at Mountain Pass in California.

Analysis by U.S. national laboratories show the Brook Mine coal contains valuable quantities of the rare earths neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium and terbium, as well as the critical minerals gallium, scandium and germanium, according to a Ramaco letter to shareholders on July 1.

“We would intend to mine it here in Wyoming, process it here in Wyoming and sell it to domestic customers including the government,” Ramaco CEO Randall Atkins said Thursday.

Manchin, who left office in January after not seeking re-election, joined the Ramaco board in April.

No new Wyoming coal mine has opened in 50 years. Wyoming’s coal industry instead has shrunk substantially since its peak over a decade ago, troubled as utilities switch to renewable energy and power plants fueled by cheaper natural gas.

The Brook Mine, stalled in part by landowners worried about groundwater depletion, has been in the works for over a decade. Atkins originally envisioned it as a source of subbituminous power plant fuel, much like Wyoming’s massive open-pit mines that supply about 40% of the nation’s coal.

A public company with metallurgical coal mines in Appalachia, Ramaco in recent years received Department of Energy grants to develop coal into carbon-based products such as carbon fiber. This year, it got a $6.1 million grant from Wyoming to build a rare earth and critical minerals processing plant.

A consultant report released this week found that fully developing the mine and processing plant would cost around $500 million, a sum that could be recovered in five years if the rare earths can be extracted and sold. Ramaco also would sell the processed coal as fuel, Atkins said.