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| Utah [Toole] rare earths project could reduce dependence on China for critical minerals |
| 2026-11-04 |
| [FoxBusinessNews] REalloys Inc. and the Army executed a non-binding term sheet for a 200-acre processing site at Tooele Army Depot in Utah The Army and a U.S.-based rare earth minerals and materials company on Tuesday took a step toward developing a heavy rare earth processing facility at a location in Utah as the U.S. looks to source the critical minerals outside of China. REalloys Inc. and the Army executed a non-binding term sheet that outlines commercial terms for a potential lease to develop a rare earth processing facility at Tooele Army Depot in Utah. The move follows the selection of REalloys for the Army's Strategic Capital Initiative in June. If the project moves forward under the provisions of the non-binding term sheet, it could see the development of the facility on about 200 acres at the base where it would process and refine target critical minerals, namely the heavy rare earth elements dysprosium and terbium. Those elements are used in things like high-temperature permanent magnets for precision-guided munitions, electric motors, sonar, radar and other defense systems. REalloys CEO Lipi Sternheim told FOX Business that the project is about having "the goods that we need to keep the country running and to advance technology – almost all things technological today involve rare earth. Whether it's your cell phone or a jet fighter, it all involves rare earth." Sternheim said that having the facility on a military base would help bring a key part of the rare earth supply chain under the military's purview to help ensure sufficient supplies of those elements for companies in the defense industrial base. "It's not necessarily so much that Utah is the most strategic location of all places, it's just a military base that suits us, it's got the few hundred acres we need," he said. "We're starting with pieces of the puzzle, but ultimately, if we should go down the road to finish from, I can't say mine because there's no mine on the base, but from oxides straight through to magnets, if we ever want to build that, there's the capability as well," he added. Rare earths have become a point of geopolitical leverage between the U.S. and China in recent years, as the Chinese government began holding back rare earths from being exported to the U.S. or West. "Once the cat's out of the bag, the U.S., the Western world out of China, has to – if they want to advance and live a good life – they have to come up with their own supply chains of these things so nobody can hold this leverage over them and decide when they're going to make their jets and when they're going to make their phones and when they aren't going to," Sternheim said. The tension between the U.S. and China has caused businesses and the government to take steps to curb reliance on Chinese rare earths. While Sternheim cautioned that it would be "a misnomer to think that it will happen overnight," he sees a path to the Western world having its own supply chain for the critical minerals by 2029 or 2030. Related: Rare earth 10/22/2026 US holds more secret talks with Myanmar's military-backed rulers in Tokyo, sources say Rare earth 09/20/2026 Trump's Greenland deal follows US firm's purchase of rare-earth metals mine Rare earth 08/28/2026 US counters China as Beijing's ‘shock wave' hits African economies |
| Posted by:Skidmark |
| #1 |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2026-11-04 06:49 |