Cinkarna Celje partner in the RecovREE Project

New Knowledge for New Opportunities

Cinkarna Celje is a partner in the research and development project Development of Innovative Waste-to-Value Technologies for Sustainable Rare Earth Recycling and Multi-Value Magnet Recycling (RecovREE), which aims to develop innovative technologies for the recovery, processing and reuse of rare earth elements. The RPTPK development team from the Titanium Dioxide Business Unit actively contributed to the preparation of the project proposal.

Rare earth elements are critical raw materials for many modern technologies. Without them, many of the products and solutions we use every day would not exist, including smartphones, computers, electric vehicles, wind turbines and advanced medical devices. As Europe remains highly dependent on imports of these materials, the development of efficient methods for recovering them from existing resources is becoming increasingly important.

The project focuses on the development of advanced waste-to-value technologies that enable materials containing rare earth elements to be transformed into new, high-performance Nd-Fe-B magnets. These are among the most powerful permanent magnets available and play a crucial role in electromobility and other advanced industrial applications. In doing so, the project contributes to the development of a circular economy, more efficient resource utilisation and greater strategic independence for European industry.

Within the project, 11 partners will develop processes for the identification, separation and extraction of rare earth elements, as well as their further processing into high-value materials and products. An important aspect of the project is the development of new technological solutions for the sustainable recycling and reuse of these strategically important raw materials.

Cinkarna Celje’s particular contribution to the project lies in its existing strategy of reducing waste while creating opportunities for the recovery of rare metals. This represents added value for the company, which already possesses materials containing rare earth elements but does not currently extract them. By utilising existing process streams that contain rare earth elements, Cinkarna Celje provides an opportunity to develop and validate new solutions in a real industrial environment. The company will develop processes for extracting rare earth elements from intermediates and waste streams and will participate in the pilot-scale validation of technologies for their sustainable recycling. In addition, Cinkarna Celje will provide research partners with access to its materials for the development and validation of new rare earth recovery methods.

Participation in the project gives Cinkarna Celje access to the expertise of leading research institutes and development partners, increasing the potential for the successful development of practical and commercially attractive solutions. At the same time, the company contributes significantly through its knowledge, industrial environment and materials to the development of technologies that could help reduce Europe’s dependence on imported critical raw materials in the future.

The project runs from 1 April 2026 to 31 May 2029. The total project value amounts to €8.07 million, of which nearly €5 million has been allocated for co-financing.

The project was selected for co-financing under the public call “Support for the Implementation of Research and Development Programmes (TRL 3–6)”. The project is co-financed by the European Union through the European Regional Development Fund and by the Republic of Slovenia.

_{Translated with AI}