Critical North American Rare Earths Supply Chain Ⅰ: NWT Mine

Nechalacho is the first rare earth mining project in Canada to begin production in June 2021. The project is located in Canada's Northwest Territories (NWT) and is a key component of the North American rare earths supply chain. It includes the development of the near-surface Tardiff and North T deposits, which are being developed in two phases during the initial stage.

This burgeoning North American rare earth supply chain began at Nechalacho, Canada's first and only rare earth mine. Nechalacho produced its first rare earth ore in June, just two years after Australia-based Vital Metals launched a unique strategy that leverages the extremely high-grade ore coming to the surface and modern mining technology to quickly build an operation with minimal environmental impact.

North T is the first deposit being mined at Nechalacho and hosts a resource of 101,000 metric tons averaging 9% total rare earth oxide. This is nearly an order of magnitude higher grade than most rare earth deposits, which tend to average about 1% TREO or less.

Vital contracted Nahanni Construction Company, a earth moving company in WTmajority owned by the Yellowknives Dene First Nation, to mine high grade rare earths in Nechalacho.

We are developing Nechalacho using the most sustainable methods possible, which includes using a local workforce so that we can support the communities surrounding our project," said Geoff Atkins, managing director of Vital Metals.

Vital's Canadian subsidiary Cheetah Resources Corp. is upgrading ore mined at North T to concentrate using the TOMRA X-ray Transport (XRT) sorter, which is expected to contain more than 30% rare earth oxides.

With no need for complex processing facilities or tailings impoundments, the Nechalacho mine is similar to a crushing yard - simply mining and crushing the near-surface rock, sorting out the best material, using little to no water and no chemicals.

"The mining industry is changing. While sorter technology is widely used in diamond mining, this is the first time sensor-based sorting has been used as a single step to produce a metal ore concentrate." TOMRA engineer Russell Tjossem says he trained members of the Yellowknives First Nation to operate the sorter, which is more environmentally friendly for North American.

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