Canada Rare Earth Corporation (CREC), a company listed on the Vancouver stock exchange, intends to implement a project to process 70 million metric tons of tailings accumulated at the Bom Futuro mining site in Rondônia, containing rare earth elements cassiterite, zircon and ilmenite. In addition, the company is to exploit an area of 9,960 hectares where the tailings piles are located and is considering acquiring and developing other areas in the vicinity.
The announcement was made by CREC's COO, Peter Shearing, who made a presentation of the company's plans to the Rondônia government. The investment to be made is estimated at R$ 1.5 billion and the enterprise should generate 300 direct jobs and 4.5 thousand indirect ones.
Located in Ariquemes, about 200 km south of Porto Velho, the state capital, Bom Futuro is considered to be the largest open pit mine in the world. The area was discovered in 1987 and, since then, a race to mine cassiterite, a tin ore, began. In the first years of activity, the area concentrated more than 15 thousand miners. Later the area was taken over by Ebesa (a company created by Paranapanema, Cesbra and Oriente Novo). In 1998, the scarcity of the ore and the crisis in the tin price, which reached US$ 5 thousand a ton (today in the LME it is above US$ 40 thousand/t), the companies gave up the business and the area was taken over by a cooperative, Coopersanta, which holds the exploration rights in the area.
With projects in North America, the Caribbean, South America, Africa, and Southeast Asia, CREC is developing an integrated business with the global rare earths industry through a supply chain that connects mining operations with concentration processes for rare earth separation, refining facilities, and major international customers.
