Rio Tinto will partner with the Government of Canada to decarbonise its Rio Tinto Fer et Titane (RTFT) operations and boost critical minerals processing with a focus on aerospace metals. 

Rio Tinto has announced plans to invest US$534M over the next eight years to decarbonise its RTFT operations in Canada and position the business as a centre of excellence for critical minerals processing. The figure includes US$162M of government funding via the Strategic Innovation Fund (SIF), which supports “…large-scale, transformative, and collaborative projects that will help position Canada to prosper in the global knowledge-based economy”.

The partnership with Government will support technological innovations that represent a first step towards reducing greenhouse gas emissions from RTFT’s titanium dioxide, steel, and metal powders business by up to 70%. It will also progress initiatives to diversify RTFT’s product portfolio, reinforcing Rio Tinto’s leadership as a North American supplier of critical materials.

RTFT operates an open cast ilmenite mine at Lac Tio near Havre-Saint-Pierre, on Quebec’s North Shore. The ore is used to produce high-quality titanium dioxide feedstock, pig iron, steel, and metal at RTFT’s metallurgical complex in Sorel-Tracy, Quebec.  

The funding will be in part used to increase scandium output which started in May this year.  Rio is planning to quadruple its production capacity to reach up to 12tpy of scandium oxide, up from the current nameplate capacity of three tonnes.

New modules will be added to the existing plant, which uses an innovative process to extract high-purity scandium oxide from the waste streams of titanium dioxide production, without the need for additional mining. The US$22-26M project is expected to start producing scandium oxide in 2024.

Other funds will be used to advance the development of a new process for extracting and refining titanium metal.  Rio Tinto is setting up a pilot plant at the RTFT metallurgical complex to validate a low-cost process which reportedly requires no harmful chemicals and does not generate direct greenhouse gas emissions. The plant is expected to be completed by the end of 2023.

The funding is Rio’s latest statement of intent towards boosting its North American critical materials offering.  RTFT is already the continent's only scandium producer, while these plans will also result in North America’s first production capacity for titanium metal.