American Rare Earths (ASX: ARR), a critical minerals company focused on reshaping the U.S. rare earths industry, has announced promising results from its leach testing program at the Halleck Creek Rare Earths Project in Wyoming. The company is advancing the Halleck Creek Project through its wholly-owned subsidiary, Wyoming Rare (USA) Inc. (“WRI”), a world-class rare earth deposit with the potential to secure America’s critical mineral independence for generations. The tests, conducted on ore from the Cowboy State Mine, show high leach recoveries of key rare earth elements and significantly lower impurity levels.
The leach testing program, comprising 25 tests, explored various parameters and methods at SGS’s laboratory in Lakefield, Ontario, Canada. Key highlights include praseodymium (Pr) leach recoveries of 85% and neodymium (Nd) recoveries of 84% under optimal conditions. Encouraging results were also seen for heavy rare earths, with terbium (Tb) recoveries at 52% and dysprosium (Dy) at 46%. The company noted that concentrations of iron and aluminium impurities post-leach were significantly lower than previous tests, approximately 5.0x and 2.9x lower, respectively.
Atmospheric Tank Leach has been chosen as the preferred leach method. American Rare Earths said this method is typically more energy and reagent-efficient and less costly than other rare earth leaching methods. The leach tests provide critical data for ongoing metallurgical testing and mineral processing flow-sheet development for the Cowboy State Mine Pre-Feasibility Study.
The next step involves SGS performing scoping impurity removal tests, a key component of the mineral processing flow-sheet design for the Pre-Feasibility Study. These advancements mark a significant milestone in technically de-risking the project and optimizing processing outcomes for rare earth magnet oxide production.
