USGS to fund projects identifying mine waste potential

The U.S. Geological Survey has invited states to compete for $5 million in cooperative agreements to find critical minerals in mine waste at active and legacy sites. The funding opportunity supports the agency’s efforts to build a national mine-waste inventory. “The USGS is partnering with state geological surveys to modernize our understanding of critical minerals in the U.S., both below…

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Rio Tinto awards $875,000 for critical minerals research

A Missouri University of Science and Technology (Missouri S&T) professor has been awarded $875,000 from Rio Tinto for a two-year project to examine new techniques to recover critical minerals in the waste byproducts from copper extraction and refining. “Our project will test new chemical dissolution strategies and purification techniques to produce pure gallium and germanium compounds from these waste materials,”…

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