Kentucky-based Ramaco Resources Inc. took an important step Tuesday to start mining rare earths in Wyoming with the announcement that it has retained global engineering firm Fluor Corp. to help build a processing plant outside of Sheridan.
Fluor has deep global experience in helping to build infrastructure for rare earths projects.
Hiring Fluor to help Ramaco turn an old coal mine north of Sheridan into a rare earths production site has big repercussions for the Lexington, Kentucky-based coal mining company with a carbon research arm headquartered in the energy-rich Powder River Basin.
“It means that we are confident in the prospects for this project, and we are putting our economics together later this year, to go forward with the design of the demonstration facility,” said Ramaco President and CEO Randall Atkins.
“It just shows the seriousness of purpose that we are confident that this project will move forward,” Atkins told Cowboy State Daily. “We’re trying to get the best people we can to work alongside us to make sure it’s a success.”
Early technical estimates have placed Ramaco’s rare earths find at $37 billion, but no one knows for sure what is in the ground until after Ramaco completes an assessment later this year.
The rare earths find in northern Wyoming’s Powder River Basin in Ranchester is considered one of the biggest in the United States, if not the world.
Ramaco has already begun some initial digging to see what’s below an old coal mine in Ranchester that covers portions of 16,800 acres, thanks to an initiative by the Pentagon’s military brass who began to worry over a dozen years ago that they wouldn’t have the strategic rare earth magnets to build their sophisticated hypersonic missiles and fighter jets needed to protect America.
Rare Earths Team
Ramaco also announced Tuesday the selection of other contractors involved in its rare earths project.
These include Swiss-based SGS, which is providing mineralogical analysis of the Ramaco project’s ore deposits; Colorado-based Hazen Research Inc., which is helping better understand the ore in the ground and provide resource recovery; and the the federal government’s National Energy Technology Laboratory, which will help Ramaco use artificial intelligence for mapping techniques to identify the highest concentrated rare earths deposits and help with mining efforts.
But Fluor is the mover-and-shaker in the project.
Fluor already is in the middle of efforts to help the United States and Australia develop rare earths processing plants that would help them counter their overreliance on Chinese sources for critical materials.
Two years ago, Fluor’s mining and metals business began work to develop Australia’s first rare earths refinery with the help of an Australian government loan. The firm is the engineering, procurement and construction management partner for Iluka Resources Ltd.’s Eneabba project, a rare earths refinery in Western Australia.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of Defense has awarded a $120 million contract to a domestic unit of Australia-based Lynas Rare Earths Ltd. to build the first heavy rare earth processing plant in the U.S., while MP Materials near Las Vegas is starting construction on a rare earth metal alloy and magnet manufacturing plant, both located in Texas.
The Big Bonanza
The rare earth minerals bonanza is the result of consumers starved for magnet metals integral to the green transition to electric vehicles, wind turbines, consumer goods, robots and military drones, missiles and chips needed for sophisticated computing power.
The military has a huge interest in rare earths and wants the critical minerals to build the U.S. Air Force’s F-35 stealth fighters and hypersonic missiles.
Fluor’s work is significant.
The company will conduct a comprehensive technical and economic assessment of rare earths mining operations for Ramaco.
Ranchester Factory
Based on this validation and economic assessment, Fluor will design the rare earth and critical mineral refining and processing demonstration plant at Ramaco's western operations in Ranchester, Atkins said.
The company is planning to start construction on this new facility in mid-2025.
Ramaco wants to build the rare earths process factory near to its research facility — called iCAM, or its Innovation of Carbon Advancement of Materials — in Ranchester.
Things are progressing quickly at iCAM, where a team of at least 15 research scientists are making plans to begin construction early next year on a $20 million demonstration plant in the rolling hills surrounding the Brook mine site, according to Atkins.
Atkins said that construction on this project will begin next spring, with an expected investment “north of $100 million" and the transition to a full-scale commercial processing plant by 2027.
“We’ll get that defined later this year,” Atkins said.
Perfect Spot
Rare earths are associated with coal, which makes their geologic formations and placement of the rare earths mine in the energy-rich Powder River Basin the perfect spot to dig up the highest valued rare earths.
By the time the rare earths processing operation is in full swing in late 2026 or early 2027, Ramaco will be pulling between 1.5 million and 2 million tons of coal annually out of the old Brook coal mine.
The rosy outlook from Ramaco is in sharp contrast to the dominant coal players in the region who continue to report shrinking production figures. Indeed, coal is still kicking in this part of the Powder River Basin despite the seemingly constant drumbeat from today’s federal government that the industry’s days are numbered.
Ramaco’s rare earths will be extracted from the coal mined at the operation through a grinding, crushing and chemical process already approved by regulators with Wyoming’s Department of Environmental Quality.
Pat Maio can be reached at pat@cowboystatedaily.com.
