Mkango and HyProMag achieve UK’s first commercial recycled rare earth alloy production, advancing HPMS technology and supporting domestic supply chains.
CoTec Holdings Corp. has announced that its partners, Mkango Resources Ltd. and HyProMag Limited, have achieved a major milestone with the first successful production of recycled rare earth alloy at commercial scale in the United Kingdom. This production, which took place at the Tyseley Energy Park (TEP) in Birmingham, marks a breakthrough for the Hydrogen Processing of Magnet Scrap (HPMS) technology, used to recover rare earth elements, specifically neodymium-iron-boron (NdFeB) alloy, from end-of-life magnets.
This milestone is of particular importance as it represents the first time that HPMS has been deployed at such a scale to produce recycled rare earth alloy. It also signifies the operational launch of the UK’s only facility dedicated to manufacturing sintered rare earth magnets, bolstering both national and international rare earth supply chains. Given the critical role rare earth elements play in the production of clean technologies like electric vehicles and wind turbines, this development stands as a notable advancement in supporting a circular economy and reducing reliance on primary mined materials.
Julian Treger, CEO of CoTec, expressed enthusiasm about the achievement, stating: “We are very pleased to witness Mkango and HyProMag accomplish this key step. We extend our congratulations to all the contributors, including the University of Birmingham and the Tyseley Energy Park teams. This production confirms HPMS technology’s viability at commercial scale and provides momentum for our similar venture in the United States.”
The successful commissioning of the Birmingham facility provides a promising outlook for HyProMag USA, a 50:50 joint venture between CoTec and HyProMag. HyProMag is a wholly owned subsidiary of Maginito Limited, which is majority-owned (79.4%) by Mkango Resources and partially owned (20.6%) by CoTec. The joint venture aims to replicate this model in the United States and is currently in the engineering phase of developing its own integrated rare earth magnet recycling and production plant in the Dallas-Fort Worth area of Texas. The facility is expected to be operational by 2027.
This achievement not only validates the effectiveness and scalability of HPMS technology but also reinforces efforts toward establishing secure, domestic sources of rare earth magnet materials. By leveraging recycled inputs and localized production, projects like these are essential in reducing dependency on rare earth imports from geopolitically sensitive regions and contribute to more resilient, sustainable industrial ecosystems.
CoTec Holdings Corp., a publicly traded investment issuer listed on the TSX Venture Exchange and OTCQB, is a progressive resource extraction company. It is dedicated to revolutionizing the global metals and minerals sector by leveraging environmentally sustainable technologies and pursuing strategic asset acquisitions.
