University of Utah gets $7.5M federal grant to advance domestic critical minerals search

SALT LAKE CITY — The push for increased domestic critical mineral production is far from a secret.

As the United States rapidly expands domestic critical mineral sources to reduce reliance on foreign countries, Utah is not just following suit but positioning itself as a domestic leader in the critical minerals race.

That push took another step forward Thursday when a University of Utah-led consortium received a $7.5 million award from the Department of Energy's Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management to identify unconventional sources of critical minerals and rare earth elements.

Think coal seams, mining waste and industrial waste as a few examples.

The project has also received over $2 million in non-DOE funding, bringing its total value to nearly $10 million.

"There is an urgent need to produce these critical materials domestically," Michael Free, a professor in the U.'s Department of Materials Science and Engineering and the project's principal investigator, said in a statement. "This project is designed to assess potential critical materials resources in locations in the Rocky Mountain region where mining has or is actively taking place, with an emphasis on resources related to coal."

The project is one of six regional efforts funded by the DOE's Carbon Ore, Rare Earth and Critical Minerals Initiative, which was established in 2020 to help coal- and fossil fuel-producing communities leverage existing carbon ore infrastructure to support new critical materials supply chains.

Regional strategies for domestic production

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox in January announced the launch of "Mission Critical" to reduce America's dependence on China for materials essential to national security and to make the Beehive State the top destination for critical mineral extraction and processing.

Currently, China controls over 90% of the world's refinery production of key components in electronics, according to data from the Institute for Energy Research. The country also produces about 70% of the world's rare earth elements and more than 60% of global titanium mining and aluminum smelter production.

The U. announced itself as a major player in lessening that foreign reliance in April when its board of trustees voted to establish the Institute for Critical and Strategic Minerals.

Then in May, the U. signed a memorandum of understanding with the National Laboratory of the Rockies to enable greater research collaborations aimed at strengthening the U.S. energy system.

But the "new" DOE project isn't entirely new, either, building on research funded by the first phase of the DOE's Carbon Ore, Rare Earth and Critical Minerals Initiative in 2021, which focused on exploring the potential for critical materials in regional basins throughout the U.S., including a $1.5 million effort led by the U. in the Uinta River Basin.

The project's next phase will expand the research from individual basins to eight regions across the country.

The University of Utah-led consortium also includes leaders from the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, the University of Wyoming and geology and mining experts at the Colorado School of Mines, along with others.

"The (Carbon Ore, Rare Earth and Critical Minerals Initiative) Phase I project efforts conducted over the past three years provide a solid foundation of CMM (critical minerals and materials) resource characterization data across the Rocky Mountain Region," Lauren Birgenheier, the project's geology team leader and associate professor in the U.'s Department of Geology and Geophysics, said in a statement. "This next phase will build on that foundation to develop a more robust understanding of (critical minerals and materials) resource volumes in key prospective geographic areas and geologic settings."

Eventually, the research team will produce a "roadmap for technology innovation centers and future strategy," said a release from the U.

Other project partners include 47G, Colorado Geological Survey, Idaho National Lab, Idaho State Geological Survey, JWP Consulting, Los Alamos National Lab, Montana Technological University, Sandia National Lab, SonoAsh, Utah Geological Survey, Utah State University Eastern and Wolverine Fuels, according to the U.

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