The Round Top heavy rare earth and critical mineral project in West Texas, US, will be powered by only renewable energy, funding and development partner USA Rare Earth announced on Tuesday.

The project is located in Hudspeth county, which reports 292 days of sunshine a year with average sunshine of about 10 hours a day. 

Citing the National Renewable Energy Laboratory of the Department of Energy, USA Rare Earth said that the average daily solar irradiance in south-western Texas was of more than 5.5 kWh/m².

The company estimates it will require about 15 MW to support mining and processing, which it estimated will require a solar farm of about 45 acres. This could increase if the company decided to relocate its sintered neo-magnet manufacturing facility and associated infrastructure to the Round Top Mountain site.

USA Rare Earth noted that Round Top would require either energy storage or trading, supplying excess energy to the grid balanced by drawing power at night and during the region’s infrequent periods of low irradiance.

CEO Pini Althaus commented that the company was committed to extend its clean-green approach into how it designed and operated the Round Top mine, which would derive about 60% of its revenue from materials used directly in green or renewable energy technologies.

“For too long, consumers in the US and other industrial democracies have been sold a green fairy tale: the electrical vehicles we drive, the laptops and smart phones we use may be clean and green, but what we are not told is that the materials mined and processed to make them often come from Chinese facilities that cause terrible pollution locally, destroy villages, harm the lives of the workers who produce them, have made the inhabitants in surrounding areas sick, and contribute to global pollution.  It’s an open secret that China employs processes that would never be tolerated in the US and other industrial democracies – processes that persist, despite China’s claims it is cleaning up its rare earth and critical mineral industries.”

“This hypocrisy has got to end. We are seeing multi-national corporations becoming ever more conscious of where they are sourcing their rare earths and battery materials. With today’s announcement, USA Rare Earth is making it clear – there’s a better way, a cleaner way, to produce clean and green materials using a clean, green process, without harming the environment and surrounding communities. The development of the Round Top project and other domestic rare earth projects is not just about the national security, economic and manufacturing issues that require immediate action to re-establish an independent supply chain, it is also about the United States and industrial democracies leading the way to ensure these critical materials are produced in an environmentally responsible manner,” Althaus added.

USA Rare Earth has an option to earn and acquire an 80% interest in the Round Top project from Texas Mineral Resources.

The preliminary economic assessment (PEA) projects a pretax net present value, using a 10% discount rate, of $1.56-billion based on a 20-year mine plan that is only 13% of the identified measured, indicated and inferred resources. 

The PEA estimates an internal rate of return of 70% and average net revenues of $395-million a year after average royalties of $26-million a year payable to the state of Texas.

 The Round Top deposit hosts 16 of the 17 rare earth elements, plus other high-value tech minerals (including lithium) and is well located to serve the US internal demand.