NYSE- and TSX-listed Energy Fuels last week made three commercial shipments of critical mineral products, including uranium, vanadium and rare-earth elements (REEs).
The three shipments of advanced materials from the White Mesa mill, in Utah, shipped a total of 15 critical elements, including the REEs cerium, praseodymium and neodymium (NdPr), samarium, europium, gadolinium, dysprosium, terbium, holmium, yttrium, erbium, thulium, ytterbium, and lutetium, along with uranium and vanadium to downstream facilities.
"I believe the week of April 4, 2022 will go down as one of the most important weeks in company history,” said president and CEO Mark Chalmers.
The White Mesa mill sent a shipment of high-purity rare earth carbonate containing 32% to 34% NdPr to Silmet in Estonia, where it will be refined and processed into various advanced materials for use in permanent magnets used in electric vehicle motors and wind generation, batteries, electronics, defense applications, and other technologies.
A shipment of uranium concentrates went to ConverDyn in Illinois for sale to US nuclear utilities for the production of carbon-free nuclear energy, and further adding to Energy Fuels' industry-leading finished US-origin uranium inventory.
Another truckload of vanadium went to Bear Met in Pennsylvania for conversion into ferrovanadium for use in high-strength steel and other advanced and specialty alloys.
"I could not be more proud of what our team is doing at the White Mesa mill on rare earths. It is hard to believe, but we are currently producing commercial-scale quantities of a rare earth material that is more advanced than any other company in the US. We even recently began commercial-scale rare earth separation in March using existing mill facilities, the first time the United States has produced a separated rare earth product in a couple of decades. Keep in mind that we only announced our entry into the rare earth space in April 2020. Yet barely two years later, Energy Fuels is producing commercial quantities of advanced rare earth materials,” said Chalmers.
“At Energy Fuels, we don't just talk about restoring critical domestic supply chains. We innovate, invest, and work hard to actually do it, all to the highest environmental, human health, and human rights standards in the world."