PROJECT DESCRIPTION
BACKGROUND
The European Commission recognises the increasing importance of rare earth elements (REEs) in Europe's green political agenda and for economic stability. The recent proposal for a European Critical Raw Material Act aims to enhance the supply and recycling of raw materials such as lithium and rare earths that are pivotal for achieving a climate-neutral continent. These materials are expected to surpass oil and gas in importance soon, with a predicted fivefold increase in demand for rare earths by 2030.
Rare earth-based permanent magnets (REE-PMs) are crucial in various sectors including renewable energy, electric mobility, and several types of electronic and industrial equipment. Despite constituting only 25% of the total rare earth production volume, the materials used for magnets represent 80-90% of the market value.
Currently, Europe faces a significant challenge in sourcing REEs. The primary extraction of REEs in Europe is exceptionally difficult due to geological and processing challenges. The majority of accessible REEs are in China, with 60% of global REE deposits. This has environmental repercussions and creates a dependency that might affect Europe's future competitiveness in emerging sectors.
As a result, Europe needs to enhance the recycling rate of REEs from waste materials, particularly from end-of-life (EOL) magnets, which are a significant source of REEs. Currently, no commercially-viable process exists to recycle REEs from EOL-PMs, as it is cheaper to purchase new materials. However, the increasing market demand is creating an enormous opportunity for recycling, driven mainly by the automotive and wind energy industries.
OBJECTIVES
The LIFE INSPIREE project aims to develop innovative recycling processes for EOL products containing REE-PM, thereby increasing REE production and recycling capacity in Europe, and reducing the environmental footprint and improving energy sustainability in REE value chains.
To achieve this, the project aims to establish Europe's first large-scale facility for recycling REE such as such as neodymium (Nd), palladium (Pd) and dysprosium (Dy) from used REE-PMs, commonly found in hard drives (HDD) and end-of-life electric motors. The proposed process offers notable technical benefits compared to current methods and with substantially reduce environmental impacts, particularly in the reuse of chemicals and water. The materials produced, including REE oxides and carbonates, have a potential commercial exploitation of output materials before the project's completion.
The specific objectives of LIFE INSPIREE are to:
Establish the first industrial-scale plant in Europe for recycling REEs from spent REE-PMs, upgrading the pilot equipment and its basic design from technology readiness level (TRL) 7 (developed in the previous NEW-RE project funded under the EIT Raw Materials Initiative) to TRL 9.
Establish commercial agreements with important stakeholders and business drivers including Neo Performance Materials, Stellantis and Magneti Ljubljana for the purchase and reuse of recycled REE in manufacturing processes.
Expand the upstream supply chain of permanent magnets (PMs) to the Itelyum plant to include transnational contacts with companies operating in nearby countries.
Increase the European processing capacity of REE-PMs to 1,000 tonnes/year (t/y), to meet the growing market demand and enhance the recycling level of rare earths from Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE), which is currently less than 1%.
RESULTS
The project’s expected results at the end of the project are:
Set-up of a TRL 9 industrial process capable of recycling some 500 t/y of PMs.
Achieving a production capacity of 170 t/y of REE (Nd, Pr, Dy) from waste.
This results are expected to be further upscaled after the project, achieving 5 y after its end a production capacity of 680 t/y of REE (Nd, Pr, Dy) from waste.
Indirect results linked to the recycling of 500 t/y of PM as a result of the avoided extraction of raw materials:
Saving of 254,000 m3/y of water.
Saving of 0.62 GWh/y of electric consumption.
Reduction of 7,200 tonnes CO2eq./y of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
