Unlocking Secondary Sources

The CMI Focus Area Unlocking Secondary Sources conducts research around the themes of Next-generation Critical Materials Recycling and Unconventional Resource Valorization. For questions or more information, please contact cmidirector@ameslab.gov.

News & Highlights

All News | All Highlights

A Review of Practical Constraints and Opportunities for Strengthening Domestic Platinum Group Metal Availability in the U.S.

Research Highlight

A summary of domestic PGM sources reviewed

$Separation of equimolar Tb-Dy feed loaded to 3 mM tREE with (top) isocratic 10 mM HCl (pH 2.0) and (bottom) proprietary effluent. (right) Yield-purity curve showing the enhanced performance of the new separation scheme relative to HCl. The 95% purity Dy fraction can be upgraded to 99.5% purity in a second cycle.$ Research Highlight

Research Projects

CMI Project 3.1.2 Biological separation of energy-critical rare earth elements

CMI Project 3.1.3 Thin film semiconductor recycling

CMI Project 3.1.5 Lithium recovery from dilute sources

CMI Project 3.1.7 (previously 1.2.1) Advanced leaching methods to recover critical materials from mineral sources

CMI Project 3.2.4 Capture and fractionation of lanthanide salts with dimethyl ether-driven fractional crystallization (DME-FC)

CMI Project 3.2.8 (previously 1.2.4) Total utilization of phosphogypsum waste for production of rare earth elements, fertilizers, and construction materials

Unlocking Secondary Sources

News & Highlights

A summary of domestic PGM sources reviewed

First demonstration of adjacent lanthanide separation by lanmodulin

Improved recovery of tellurium from spent CdTe photovoltaics

CMI technology drives advances in electrochemical graphitization to optimize reactive surface area

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