DOE Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation Awards $75 Million for Five Projects to Extract Minerals from Coal and Coal-Based Feedstocks: It Follows Earlier Announcement to Spend $134 Million to Shore Up REE Supply Chains

     The U.S. Dept of Energy’s Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation announced awards of $75 million to five energy projects for the extraction of critical minerals from coal and coal-based feedstocks. These include the extraction of rare earth elements (REEs). These awards are part of the funding for the DOE’s Mines & Metals Capacity Expansion – Piloting Byproduct Critical Minerals and Materials Recovery at Domestic Industrial Facilities. The funding will be used to develop pilot projects. The recipients are listed below.

“American industrial facilities have the potential to produce valuable critical materials from coal and coal byproducts,” said Assistant Secretary of Energy (EERE) Audrey Robertson. “By investing in these facilities, we can increase domestic critical materials production and help mitigate the financial risk of commercial deployment.”    

     This funding is a part of the nearly $1 billion in funding announced last year to advance and scale mining, processing, and manufacturing technologies across key stages of the critical minerals and materials supply chains. It follows the announcement on June 2 to spend $134 million to bolster rare earth element supply chains. The two projects listed below plan to extract REEs from industrial waste, the first from bauxite ore waste, and the second from “domestic industrial waste-derived feedstocks.”

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DOE’s Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation Awards $75 Million to Accelerate Critical Minerals and Materials Recovery from Coal and Coal-Based Feedstocks. U.S. Dept. of Energy. July 1, 2026. DOE’s Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation Awards $75 Million to Accelerate Critical Minerals and Materials Recovery from Coal and Coal-Based Feedstocks | Department of Energy

DOE’s Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation Announces $134 Million To Bolster Rare Earth Element Supply Chains. U.S. Dept. of Energy. June 2, 2026. DOE’s Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation Announces $134 Million To Bolster Rare Earth Element Supply Chains | Department of Energy