I've read several papers on extraction processes to avoid the formation of silica gel. Heating and pretreating with acid to create water soluble metal salts then leaching with water to recover the REE is the general gist of it.
The process exists at lab scale but what I don't know is how the economics look at scale.
I'm sure there are people out there that do know this however and have got some back of an envelope numbers worked out.
Surely with such a basic process, relatively inexpensive chemicals and the high value of REE it is likely to ve viable.
We will find out I guess.
Someone was buying this recently that was in the know about something. Was it Tanbreez? Was it an economically favourable extraction process? Was it the soon to be liquid CRML holding book value?
I would suggest it wasn't Wolfsberg or Saudi related however, which is somewhat concerning given that was the reason most of us got into this originally.
I did momentarily consider taking a bit off the table when the oppies were up last week as a pullback felt inevitable. But I really do think there is a strong likelihood they may 10x or better in the next 4-6weeks from here and after this long it would really suck to miss out on that.
I've made piece with just seeing this through and hang on for the ride as they approach expiry. Certainly theres a lot of moving parts to this and anything could happen. TS is certainly trying to pull a rabbit out of the hat.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/311982192_Leaching_of_rare_earth_elements_from_eudialyte_concentrate_by_suppressing_silica_gel_formation
(20min delay)