Appreciate the inherent beauty of heterogenous minerals and materials, such as coal. – Charles Atkins (Ramaco)
Coal is a palette with many beautiful possibilities. Evan Granite (NETL).
These open-minded attitudes mean that coal can be seen as a carbon resource with so much more potential than just burning to release energy. It can contribute to national security and reducing some environmental concerns. For some, this attitude may require quite a shift in mindset!
Rare earth elements (REEs) are needed in increasing amounts for modern technologies as dependence on them grows, for example for batteries and renewable energy. Worldwide, China is responsible for 70% of REE mining and 91% of the processing. This means that, as a matter of national security, the hunt is on in many countries to find their own resources and then to develop them. One of the leaders in this field is Ramaco Resources, based in Wyoming and led by Randall Atkins.
Ramaco excel in bringing together experts in all the fields related to the extraction and processing of REEs as well as developing alternative uses of coal – ‘carbon ore’ as it may be known. As a result the 4th Ramaco Research Rodeo took place in Sheridan, Wyoming from 9-11 July and the ICSC was delighted to collaborate with them on this timely and important event. It also coincided with the local rodeo which made for a really fun and unique outing.
To give some background – Ramaco bought Brook Mine, near Sheridan in 2013 and started to ask the question ‘What else can you do with coal?’ It turned out that the US national laboratories were asking the same question, so a collaboration started which has resulted in the annual Ramaco Research Rodeo.
The political importance and national security concerns of developing indigenous REE supplies was apparent from the number of supportive messages for the event recorded by a range of US senators and a fascinating presentation from Robert Spelbrink of the FBI.
Dr Andrew Minchener (ICSC) opened the first session with an insightful look at the need to rationalise China’s demands with consumers needs, based on his wealth of experience of China and his knowledge of REEs. Dr Stephen Mills (ICSC) followed with his work on the potential of coal wastes as a source of REEs – the advantages including the vast stockpiles in many countries and the concentration of REE in this material. However, the extraction and processing techniques are still in development. Steve’s report on REE will be published by the ICSC later in 2024.
Alex Moyes (Ramaco) gave an update on the ongoing work at Brook Mine, They are taking many core samples to identify where the concentration of REE is greatest and have found that many of them are attached to Uranium and Thorium, and tend to concentrate in the clay 5-6 feet below the coal seam. The aim is to start pilot operations in 2025, and this research will enable them to mine clever, that is, to take a targeted approach making the minimal environmental impact possible as well as being more economic.
Charles Atkins reminded the delegates that a coal tree showing all the products available from coal had been published in 1933, so coal refineries have been in existence for 100 years. He suggested the ‘cure for coal’ had four objectives, it should:
- Be clean and promote decarbonisation
- Be more profitable than current uses
- Out compete alternative feedstocks
- Equal or exceed the scale of the coal industry.
This outlook means that Ramaco is looking to extract critical minerals and REE from Brook Mine, is using AI for prospecting and mining, and is aiming to produce graphite and other carbon products and applications from its coal resource.
This thinking was developed in the session on carbon and coal-based materials and products, chaired by Edgar Lara-Curzio (Oak Ridge National Laboratory). Edgar and Eric Wolf (Ramaco) described their potentially ground-breaking work on electrochemical graphitization, which produces graphite from coal at a temperature of only 850°C and in 4 and a half hours, compared to up to two weeks and over 2700°C for the traditional Acheson/Castner process. Thus, the capital and operating costs are expected to be considerably lower than those for current methods of synthetic graphite production. Work continues on refining the process. It is acknowledged that the graphite produced may not be of the highest quality, but can serve many of the roles where graphite is currently used.
For example, graphite and silicon are great for holding lithium in batteries, needed for EVs, as described by Nicolas Stadie (Montana State University). Work is ongoing at MSU to ascertain if Silicon/Carbon anodes can be a ‘cure for coal’. Other coal derived products such as coal plastic composite decking and carbon foam manufacturing were described by Jason Trembly (Ohio University).
Prof Ariel Furst (MIT) described her fascinating work on using microbes for a range of processes including critical mineral recovery. The use of microbes reduces the energy demand, cost and environmental impact of the process. She also showed how microbes could be used to convert CO2 into a range of products including formic acid, formaldehyde, methanol, acetic acid, methane, ethanol and ethylene in a cost-effective way.
The role of AI in the minerals industry was explained by Prof Rajive Ganguli (University of Utah). As he said, ‘the key is not the math, it’s the data and the thinking that takes place before the AI’. Thus, AI can help, but useful data must be used and human thinking applied.
An international angle was brought to the meeting by Annikie Moganelwa (Eskom) who described their work on identifying the potential for extracting REEs and processing them from coal in South Africa.
This was a wide-ranging meeting and no one could have come away from it thinking coal is just for burning. A huge thank you to the Ramaco team for this challenging and stimulating event. https://r3-conference.com/