Week of December 17, 2025
Week of December 17, 2025
From China's tightening grip on critical minerals to America's scramble for supply chain security, these were the most-read Metal Tech News stories of 2025. In 2025, Metal Tech News published more than 500 articles examining the scientific advances, mining initiatives, policy shifts, and geopolitical forces reshaping global supply chains for critical minerals and technology metals. Readers gravitated toward stories that exposed vulnerabilities in U.S. and allied supply... Full story
Board greenlights initial underground mine development at Elk Creek in Nebraska. In a move that will elevate Elk Creek from a promising critical minerals project in southeast Nebraska to an early-stage mine preparing to deliver niobium, scandium, titanium, and rare earths into American supply chains, NioCorp Development Ltd.'s board of directors has approved the $44.6 million Elk Creek Mine Portal project. "Given the size of this excavation work, the Portal Project really... Full story
High-tech demand, criticality, and price skyrocket. 2025 has been electric for silver, a metal best known for its white-collar role as a safe-haven asset for individual and institutional investors, yet one that does its hardest work as a blue-collar metal underpinning the automotive, green energy, and high-tech sectors of the global economy. Amid global economic and geopolitical instability, unprecedented growth in high-tech demand, and the mining industry's inability to keep... Full story
Real-time core scanning prompts deeper drilling into strong mineralization at Northisle project. The annals of mineral exploration are filled with stories of drill holes abandoned due to a lack of visible mineralization, only to learn later that a few more meters would have tapped a zone capable of changing a project's trajectory. Real-time geochemical data delivered by Veracio helped prevent such a scenario from playing out at Northisle Copper and Gold Inc.'s North Island... Full story
First processing step completed as critical minerals recovery site moves from buildout to startup. After months of construction and permitting at its Chambers County site, Metallium Ltd. has begun commissioning at its Texas Technology Campus, completing the first processing step of its Flash Joule Heating (FJH) recovery system and moving the facility from physical build-out into staged operational startup for the company's U.S. critical-metals recovery platform. Following... Full story
A seafood byproduct-derived polymer could turn mine waste into a source of rare earths. Seeking a way to transform the cleanup of old mine sites from a costly endeavor into a rare-earth-producing enterprise, University of Missouri researchers have developed a specialized polymer that targets individual rare earth elements at the molecular level. The selectivity of these polymers is key to unlocking value from the notoriously intertwined suite of elements known as rare earths.... Full story
