VML General Comments - Chat, page-6004

Hi ChappyPappy,

Excellent pickups and posts, you must have been working the nightshift! It makes you wonder why they need a 2 day trading halt when all the info is already in the public domain.

IMO is very much a positive for VML that their RE oxide offtake partner, REEtec, have signed a REO supply agreement with Schaeffler, a major supplier of electrical components to the automotive industry. One of the most positive aspects for me is that it goes some way to validate REEtec's REO separation process, which to date have been shrouded in mystery.

As someone with some expertise in this area, do you have any views/opinion on the REEtec process? I've done a little research into the SecREEts program which is funded by the EU with a goal of ensuring a supply of REE's to European industry, and have found that REEtec's process was originally developed to extract REO's as a by-product from Yara's phosphate rock (apatite) fertiliser production. Very little detail on the REEtec process is available, however I've seen references to a 'novel' ion exchange (IX) process , which according to EU/Cordis"Separate REEs by a novel chromatographic process into distinct nitrate salts" and that "The novel separation concept is by far more environmentally friendly than existing liquid-liquid extraction based on organic solvents and complexing agents". IX chromatography in my understanding is a common chemical extraction/refining process used in the pharmaceutical industry and for lab analysis of minerals, but not generally considered scalable to bulk mineral processing applications.

Of note for me in the recently announced Iluka's Eneabba rare earths refinery FID is that the REO separation technology selected will be conventional solvent exchange (SX) in vats, as per Lynas at LAMP and by the vast majority of Chinese refiners. IMO It would be a real step forward if someone can develop a bulk REO extraction and separation process that is less environmentally damaging and more cost efficient than SX.