The Illinois Rare Earth Novel Extract & Supply (IRENES) project aims to strengthen domestic supply chains while addressing the mining legacy.
The U.S. Department of Energy has awarded funding to a project that seeks to recover critical minerals from coal mine waste. The Illinois Rare Earth Novel Extract & Supply (IRENES) project plans to conduct Front-End Engineering and Design (FEED) necessary to establish a fully integrated, vertical supply chain for multiple critical minerals located entirely within Illinois. It is led by the Illinois State Geological Survey at the Prairie Research Institute, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. According to the Institute, all solid materials within the waste stream will be converted to products for further use, strengthening domestic supply chains while addressing environmental challenges posed by mines.
In February, the DOE first announced that it would fund IRENES and two other projects seeking to uncover rare earth elements and other critical minerals from coal waste streams. The project has now been fleshed out: Besides rare earth elements, IRENES plans to recover lithium, nickel, zinc, cobalt, manganese, and potentially high-purity aluminum. The researchers propose two facilities for this: The first is planned near coal mines and waste sites in southern Illinois, focused on extracting and concentrating critical minerals while converting the remaining solid waste into building materials. The second one, located at APL Engineered Materials, Inc. in Urbana, Illinois, will focus on refining mixed rare earth elements into oxides and metals.
Waste From the Last Industrial Revolution Could Fuel the Next One
Charles Bopp, the project’s co-principal investigator, highlighted the potential impact for Illinois: “The IRENES project will use wastes from the last industrial revolution to supply materials for the next industrial revolution while fostering sustainable economic growth in disadvantaged communities.“
IRENES is not the first project seeking to recover critical minerals from coal mine waste. Especially in states with a long coal-mining history, efforts to repurpose mines have been going on for a while, as mining critical minerals could give coal mines a second life and bring back jobs to the states lost in the advent of the coal phase-out. A team from West Virginia University led by Dr. Paul Ziemkiewicz has made significant progress in extracting rare earth elements from acidic mine drainage and has received multiple funds to expand the project since. Other projects range from using algae to bacteria to uncover the coveted raw materials.
Photo: iStock/Maksim Safaniuk