REG - Rainbow Rare Earths - Successful Development of Extraction Flowsheet

Rainbow Rare EarthsAnnouncement

28/06/2022 07:01

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RNS Number : 3569Q  Rainbow Rare Earths Limited  28 June 2022

 

28 June 2022

Rainbow Rare Earths Limited

("Rainbow" or "the Company")

LSE: RBW

 

 Rainbow Confirms Successful Development of Rare Earths Extraction Flowsheet

 

Rainbow Rare Earths confirms the development of a process flowsheet to extract
rare earth elements efficiently from the phosphogypsum stacks at the Company's
Phalaborwa Project in South Africa. This innovative process has been developed
by Rainbow in collaboration with K-Technologies, Inc., USA ("K-Tech"),
following extensive test work carried out at ANSTO Minerals, Australia, and at
K-Tech's facilities in Florida, U.S.A.

Historically, the extraction of rare earths from phosphogypsum has proven
technically, environmentally and economically challenging. However, Rainbow
and K-Tech have developed a process flowsheet at Phalaborwa, underpinned by
comprehensive test work, which successfully delivers an overall recovery of
between 65% to 70% of the contained rare earths. This compares very favourably
to the overall recovery of separated rare earth oxides via standard processes.
Importantly, the process employs standard, proven equipment and readily
available reagents in a novel combination. Rainbow and K-Tech will jointly
patent the process with a view to applying this to further rare earths
projects.

Following leaching of the phosphogypsum with sulphuric acid and subsequent
rapid concentration of the rare earths in the pregnant leach solution, the
concentrated rare earths solution is upgraded in K-Tech's proprietary
continuous ion exchange ("CIX") and continuous ion chromatography ("CIC")
process to deliver high-purity oxides of the target magnet rare earths, namely
neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium and terbium.

CIX and CIC have both been applied commercially in multiple applications since
their development in the 1980s. These processes are now found globally in the
food, biotech, chemical, water treatment, pharmaceutical and mining
industries. Several of these industrial installations are found in South
Africa.

The CIX/CIC process has several economic and environmental advantages over the
conventional solvent extraction route, which include:

·    Nine process stages are required for the CIC separation, versus
hundreds of stages in the solvent extraction ("SX") method depending on the
desired product mix;

·    No hazardous or toxic solvents are required, whereas they are
integral to the SX process;

·    Capital and operating costs are significantly lower for CIX/CIC
compared to SX; and

·    Working capital requirements for CIX/CIC are minimised when compared
to SX, due to the shorter time required for the production and delivery of
saleable product.

Now that this important milestone has been successfully delivered, Rainbow
looks forward to completing the technical feasibility study, which is expected
to demonstrate this to be one of the lowest cost global producers of separated
rare earth oxides.

 

Rainbow Rare Earths CEO, George Bennett, commented: "Working closely with
K-Tech, we have been able to identify and confirm a novel process which will
allow us to recover valuable rare earth oxides in a low capex and opex manner
from phosphogypsum.  We are now in the process of jointly patenting this
intellectual property with K-Tech and believe it will allow us to secure
additional rare earths opportunities, such as the previously announced
collaboration with a major chemicals group in South Africa.

Importantly, whilst the configuration of this new flowsheet is innovative,
each individual stage is well tested on a commercial basis, with the required
equipment and reagents being readily available.

Since introducing Phalaborwa to our portfolio in December 2020, we have always
indicated that we believe it to be an exciting and near-term development
opportunity to produce critical rare earths required for the green energy
transition. The confirmation of an efficient and economic rare earths
extraction flowsheet for the Project represents within 18 months a remarkable
achievement for our business and underlines the significant amount of work
carried out at the Project to date."

**ENDS**

Market Abuse Regulation ("MAR") Disclosure

This announcement contains inside information for the purposes of Article 7 of
the Market Abuse Regulation (EU) 596/2014 as it forms part of UK domestic law
by virtue of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 ("MAR"), and is
disclosed in accordance with the Company's obligations under Article 17 of
MAR.

 

For further information, please contact:

 

 Rainbow Rare Earths Ltd         Company  George Bennett     +27 82 652 8526

                                          Pete Gardner
 SP Angel Corporate Finance LLP  Broker   Ewan Leggat        +44 (0) 20 3470 0470

                                          Charlie Bouverat
 Tavistock Communications        PR/IR    Charles Vivian     +44 (0) 20 7920 3150

                                          Tara Vivian-Neal   rainbowrareearths@tavistock.co.uk (mailto:rainbowrareearths@tavistock.co.uk)

 

Notes to Editors:

About K-Technologies Inc.:

K-Tech is a chemical process development and applications company serving the
minerals and chemicals industries. K-Tech specialises in the development of
process technologies that require unique recovery and/or component separation
demands, especially those related to continuous separation methodologies.
K-Tech has extensive knowhow and experience of separation processes involving
continuous ion exchange, continuous ion chromatography and advanced sorption
techniques as they apply to a variety of chemical and environmental
applications.

 

 

 

 

About Rainbow Rare Earths:

Rainbow's strategy is to become a globally significant producer of rare earth
metals. NdPr and Dy are vital components of the strongest permanent magnets
used for the motors and turbines driving the green technology revolution.
Analysts are predicting demand for magnet rare earth oxides will grow
substantially over the coming years, driven by increasing adoption of green
technology, pushing the overall market for NdPr and Dy into deficit.

 

The Phalaborwa Rare Earths Project, located in South Africa, comprises an
Inferred Mineral Resource Estimate of 38.3Mt at 0.43% TREO contained within
gypsum tailings stacked in unconsolidated stacks derived from historic
phosphate hard rock mining and processing. High value NdPr oxide represents
29.1% of the total contained rare earth oxides, with economic Dysprosium and
Terbium oxide credits enhancing the overall value of the rare earth basket in
the stacks.  The rare earths are contained in chemical form in the gypsum
stacks, which is expected to allow high-value separated rare earth oxides to
be produced with lower operating costs than a typical rare earth mineral
project.

 

The Company's Gakara Project in Burundi has produced one of the highest-grade
rare earth concentrates in the world (typically 54% TREO) through trial mining
operations. The Gakara basket is weighted heavily towards NdPr, which account
for approximately 19.5% of the contained TREO and 85% of the value of the
concentrate. The Gakara project is currently on care and maintenance at the
request of the Government of Burundi.

 

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