Rare earth elements (REEs) are essential to many advanced technologies, but complex mining-based and electronic waste feedstocks can make their separation and purification challenging. Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) is developing a membrane solvent extraction process designed to separate critical REEs from other rare earth elements in domestic mining feedstocks and electronic waste, including scrap permanent magnets. The technology offers a compact, continuous, and scalable approach to rare earth separation and could support domestic production and recovery of high-purity critical materials for applications including electric vehicles, advanced manufacturing, and defense.
Description
ORNL’s membrane solvent extraction technology provides an alternative approach for processing mining-based and electronic waste feedstocks containing complex mixtures of rare earth elements and impurities. The system uses a specialized membrane-based configuration and selective extraction chemistry to separate targeted groups of rare earth elements, including critical materials such as dysprosium, neodymium, praseodymium, and terbium from elements such as cerium and lanthanum. This capability can also be applied to scrap permanent magnets containing cerium that needs to be removed.
The process is designed for continuous operation in a compact, modular configuration that can be scaled to different processing requirements. Compared with conventional separation approaches, the technology has the potential to reduce chemical use, waste generation, energy requirements, and operating and capital costs while avoiding challenges such as emulsion formation. The process may also be integrated with related ORNL membrane separation technologies to support recovery and purification of both heavy and light rare earth elements from multiple mining-based and electronic waste feedstock sources.
Benefits
- Compact, modular process configuration
- Continuous rare earth separation
- Scalable for different processing requirements
- Potential for reduced chemical use and waste generation
- Potential for lower operating and capital costs
- Avoids emulsion formation associated with some conventional separation processes
- Supports production of high-purity critical rare earth elements
Applications and Industries
- Rare earth mining and processing
- Critical materials production and purification
- Mineral processing
- Electric vehicle supply chains
- Advanced manufacturing
- Defense applications
- Rare earth recovery from mining-based feedstocks
Contact
To learn more about this technology, email [email protected] or call 865-574-1051.
Researchers
Contact
To learn more about this technology, email [email protected] or call 865-574-1051.