A team of scientists led by Estibalitz Ukar is refining a mining technology that uses CO2 to weaken rock containing critical minerals, making mining less energy-intensive and capturing greenhouse gases. The three-year project is supported by a $5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy. The field test is planned to take place in one of 20 newly discovered ore bodies near the U.S.-Canada border that are forecast to be an important new source of critical minerals in North America. The project is part of the Mining Innovations for Negative Emissions Resource Recovery program, which aims to increase domestic supplies of critical elements required for the transition to low-carbon or carbon-free energy. The integrated team of experts from various universities and institutions will work to find creative ways to reduce costs and emissions, find new sources of metals, and make the mines of the future more sustainable.
New Mining Technology Utilizes CO2 to Control Critical Minerals: Study
Researchers at the Bureau of Economic Geology at the University of Texas at Austin have developed a mining technology that can reduce the amount of energy needed to access critical minerals, which are crucial for modern energy technologies, while capturing greenhouse gases along the way, according to a study published in the journal of the US Department of Energy.
Low-carbon energy technologies require vast amounts of critical minerals, such as lithium, nickel, and cobalt, which are found in low concentrations in the Earth’s crust. Mining these minerals is energy-intensive and produces waste, resulting in significant greenhouse gas emissions, such as CO2.
This new technology uses CO2 to weaken the rock containing critical minerals, making it easier and less energy-intensive to mine while reducing emissions. The end goal is to store these emissions safely in rocks, potentially even making mining carbon-negative by piping in and storing CO2 emissions from other industrial operations.
The CO2 storage is possible due to the chemical reactions between CO2 and ultramafic rocks that contain critical minerals. The CO2 weakens the rock structure, making minerals easier to mine, and partly turns the rock into limestone, where CO2 is stored permanently.
According to Estibalitz Ukar, a research scientist at the Bureau of Economic Geology at the UT Jackson School of Geosciences, “Mining processes create a lot of CO2 as a byproduct. If you can capture what is produced at the mine, then you can come up with a low-emission operation, which is good, but we want to use the CO2-reducing properties of ultramafic rocks to help eliminate even more CO2.”
This innovative technology could be a game-changer in the mining industry, reducing energy consumption and emissions while providing access to critical minerals necessary for modern energy technologies.
$5M Grant Given to Support Low-Emission Mining Technology for Critical Minerals
A team of scientists, led by Estibalitz Ukar, is perfecting a mining technology that uses CO2 to weaken rock containing critical minerals, making mining less energy-intensive and capturing greenhouse gases along the way. The mining technology has been supported by a $5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy.
The three-year project aims to refine the mining method in the lab for two years before conducting a full-scale field test in partnership with Canada Nickel Company. The test will be conducted in one of 20 newly discovered ore bodies near the U.S.-Canada border, which are expected to be a vital source of critical minerals in North America.
The project also hopes to make low-grade deposits more economically viable, thereby increasing the available supply of domestically produced critical minerals. Ukar stresses the urgency of meeting the rising demand for critical minerals as we transition into low-emission technologies, such as electric vehicles, within the next three to five years. The project is part of the Mining Innovations for Negative Emissions Resource Recovery program, a new initiative aimed at developing market-ready technologies that will increase domestic supplies of critical elements required for the transition to low-carbon or carbon-free energy.
The mining technology brings together the expertise of scientists from the Bureau of Economic Geology and Department of Geological Sciences in the UT Jackson School, as well as researchers from the UT departments of Petroleum & Geosystems Engineering and Aerospace Engineering & Engineering Mechanics; Columbia University; the University of Bern; and Carbfix, an Iceland-based project that uses a similar method to store CO2 in basalt.
The Gulf Coast Carbon Center and TexNet seismic monitoring system from the Bureau of Economic Geology are part of the project, ensuring carbon is safely stored and detecting any seismic activity caused by the mining method. The integrated team is critical to success, said Bureau of Economic Geology Director Scott Tinker.
In addition to the $5 million grant, Ukar has received a separate $1 million grant from the DOE’s National Energy Technology Laboratory to find places in the U.S. where the new mining technology can be applied. If successful, the technology could be useful in mining operations globally.
Don’t miss interesting posts on Famousbio
