Rare earth and magnet hub for resilient Europe

REMHub

Funded by Horizon EU, the new Rare Earth and Magnets Hub for Resilient Europe (REMHub) project will establish a digital innovation hub to advance EU excellence for REEs and rare earth magnets. REEs and magnets are vital for the green energy transition and European Green Deal. The EU relies on imports for about 90% of REEs, highlighting the need for European expertise and strategic partnerships.

Funders

Project information

Project duration

-

Funding amount

16 000 000 EUR

Project coordinator

CLIC Innovation

Contact information

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Project description

With nearly 90% of REEs sources from outside the EU, there is a significant opportunity to develop European expertise and establish strategic partnership in rare earth metals processing. Although REEs recycling faces challenges, with current rates below 5% and some extraction processes needing sustainability improvements, these obstacles also offer substantial potential for innovation and growth. As demand for REEs increases, driven by electric vehicles, wind turbine motors, and electrolysers for clean hydrogen, there is tremendous opportunity to enhance recycling efforts and to develop more sustainable extraction processes within the EU. The University of Oulu (UOulu), which is receiving over 2 million euros will focus on the novel REEs processing involving ores crushing and grinding using two novel Continuously Compressing Crushers (CCC) ( https://www.oulu.fi/en/news/new-crushing-method-saves-water-and-energy-mines-and-produces-better-battery-raw-materials-for), innovative refining and separation technologies utilizing hybrid membrane-based technologies, quality assurance and risk management, KPIs monitoring strategy for hub development, stakeholder engagement, and capacity building.

Project actions

REMHub will develop test and pilot novel technologies for the exploration and primary production of REEs and for recovering them from side streams to enhance supply security of REEs and rare magnets in the EU. In addition, the project will develop Re-X (Recycle, Reuse, refurbishment and repurpose) technologies for rare earths and valuable metals from end-of-life products as well as electric machine design for easier permanent magnet recycling. The project will also identify and engage relevant stakeholders to develop REE value chains in the EU. The innovation hub will ensure that the novel technologies developed in the project will be commercialized and offered as services via digital platform in the future.