LARAMIE, Wyo. — The University of Wyoming School of Energy Resources was recently selected to receive $7.5 million from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management to lead a regional coalition expanding a domestic critical mineral and materials supply.
The project, totaling more than $10.1 million, will assess the carbon ore, rare earth and critical mineral potential of the Great Plains and Interior Highlands, which is composed of 10 states and four basins first studied under Phase I of DOE’s initiative.
Part of a national strategy to find alternative domestic sources of rare earth elements and critical minerals, the DOE investment will expand the focus from basin-level to regional-scale in order to accelerate the development of critical mineral and materials supply chains. These include novel nonfuel carbon-based products from secondary and unconventional feedstocks, such as coal and coal waste.
The project team is led by co-principal investigators Tyler Brown, an SER associate research professional; Dave Aadland, director of UW’s Center for Business and Economic Analysis and a UW professor of economics; along with Selena Gerace and Davin Bagdonas, both SER senior research professionals. Bagdonas previously served as the principal investigator for a Phase I project in Wyoming’s Greater Green River and Wind River basins.
“We made significant strides in assessing the coal basins traversing Wyoming, Colorado and Montana as part of our two previously awarded CORE-CM projects, including making valuable connections along the entire critical mineral supply chain,” Brown said. “In this new regional phase, we hope to expand on these collaborations and lessons learned to develop a nexus of resources and streamline economic growth for a larger part of the region.”
Additional partners on the project representing industry, academia and state agencies include the Energy and Environmental Research Center at the University of North Dakota; Kansas Geological Survey; Oklahoma Geological Survey; Penn State University; Colorado School of Mines; University of Texas at Austin; Battelle; Los Alamos National Laboratory; Colorado Geological Survey; and South Dakota School of Mines and Technology.
Specific research areas will cover basins throughout Wyoming, including the Powder River Basin; North Dakota; Kansas; South Dakota; Montana; Nebraska; Colorado; Missouri; Oklahoma; and Arkansas.
In additional projects under the same funding selection, SER also will support a similar University of Utah-led effort in the Rocky Mountain Region covering western areas of Wyoming, Colorado and Montana, as well as Utah, New Mexico and Idaho; and the Gulf Coast-Permian Basin project led by the University of Texas at Austin.
“We are pleased that vital work conducted under Phase I of the CORE-CM Initiative will be built upon with the input, expertise and leadership of our incredible research team,” said Scott Quillinan, SER senior director of research. “Wyoming’s significant basins have been assigned to different regions, so we are so happy that our work can continue and have an even wider impact for the country in establishing a meaningful development of nationwide critical mineral supply chains.”
A full list of project selections can be viewed here.
