Published: September 13, 2021 |

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American Resources Corporation has spent the past several years consolidating assets to build out its metallurgical carbon platform.

It is staffed by a team of former private equity executives and consultants with a sentimental attachment to Appalachia and its coal, who are keen to stage a turnaround in how business is done there.

American Resources operates five complexes located primarily within Pike, Perry, Knott, and Letcher Counties in Kentucky and Wyoming County in West Virginia. The company’s primary focus is on supplying steel mills and electric arc furnaces with metallurgical Carbon, PCI, and specialty alloy metals along with metal products.

The company has gobbled up a number of struggling coal operations across Central Appalachia. Its takeovers include McCoy Elkhorn Coal, Dean Mining, ICG Knott County, Wyoming County Coal, Empire Kentucky Land, the PointRock Mine, and Perry County Resources.

The company also has two licenses for rare earth mineral processing and graphene patents from Ohio University, expanding its patent and technology base to be used for rare earth element (REE) and critical mineral separation as well as the future production of graphene and advanced carbon products. 

American Resources also has technology license agreements with Penn State University’s Department of Energy and Mineral Engineering to separate and extract pre-concentrate critical and REE minerals from carbon-based resources, like coal ash from coal-fired power plants.

“The advancement and evolution of our rare earth element Capture - Process - Purify process chain is extremely exciting for us and we feel it’s at the forefront of rare earth element innovation, which is critical for creating a resilient national supply chain,” said American Resources CEO Mark Jensen in a recent statement.

“This supplemental equipment we are adding to our electrolysis process and analysis is key as we progress with our mobile electrolysis facility and more directly, where we send our mobile facility for further analysis post our initial analysis of feedstock samples sent to our technical partners through our fly ash sampling program,” added Jensen.

“A key for the commercialization of this process is being able to turn samples quickly and efficiently when evaluating fly ash deposits. Having a microwave digestor in combination with an ICP-OES machine enables real-time lab analysis of REE and critical element concentrates of fly ash, versus having to send off to an external lab. This functionality selected by our team in Texas is a strong step forward in our process,” concluded Jensen.

How Is It Doing

Halfway through 2021, it’s been an active time for American Resources.

On the financial front, the company in June closed a $30.1 million registered direct offering, boosting its balance sheet to near $40 million. In the same month, its stock also joined the Russell Microcap Index, giving the company exposure to more investors.

The offering builds on its sponsorship of a $100 million special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) — American Acquisition Opportunity Inc, whose initial public offering in March consisted of 10 million units at $10 each. The SPAC is a blank check company targeting acquisitions in the landholding and resource industry.

On the technology front, American Resources achieved another milestone in June when it successfully recovered neodymium (REE) with a 99.5 percent purity from waste magnets, a standard required for high-quality permanent magnet manufacturing.

Neodymium magnets are considered the strongest type of permanent magnet available commercially. Such magnets have replaced other types of magnets in many applications that require strong permanent magnets, such as electric motors, hard disk drives, and magnetic fasteners.

Meanwhile, the company is ramping up the development of its supply chain for waste magnets and lithium-ion batteries that can be recycled for their critical and REEs. 

It has recently picked up its first waste wind turbine motors and generators to be processed and recycled using its environmentally safe ligand-assisted displacement (LAD) chromatography, which was recently licensed in partnership with Hasler Ventures and Purdue University.

That said, the company is staffing up as it aggressively advances its Capture-Process-Purify process chain for critical and REEs to commercialization and to further develop its aftermarket distribution channels and strategic partnerships for certain waste products to be processed and recycled for their high-value raw materials. Even President Joe Biden is behind such initiatives.

These end-of-life products would include electric/hybrid vehicles such as the Toyota Prius, e-bikes, wind turbines, NMR machines, MRI machines, and certain industrial motors.

In July, the company also announced that it is progressing towards the commercialization of its REE electrolysis processing technology. The company said it has procured supplemental equipment to enhance the functionality of the 2kW mobile electrolytic cell REE processing plant currently in the build phase in conjunction with its sponsored research partner Texas Tech University. 

American Resources noted that its electrolytic cell REE processing facility represents a novel approach for the revalorization of coal, coal waste, and coal byproducts such as fly ash, utilizing Coal Electrolytic Cell (CEC) technology for the production of REE concentrate, carbon, purified fly ash, and hydrogen. The company is initially targeting fly ash deposits rich in REEs such as dysprosium, neodymium, and praseodymium, among others.

In a related development, the company has engaged ex-Eli Lilly executive William Smith III to design and build its rare earth and critical mineral purification facilities. It said the facilities will utilize LAD chromatography technology.

The company has also hired Jeff Peterson as a senior member of its American Rare Earth division to help with the development and commercialization of its technology. With nearly 20 years of experience in operations, engineering, sales, and product development, Peterson began his career as a Commissioned Officer in the US Navy onboard nuclear-powered submarines.

Source: Proactive Investors

About American Resources Corporation
American Resources Corporation is a next-generation, environmentally and socially responsible supplier of high-quality raw materials to the new infrastructure market. The company is focused on the extraction and processing of metallurgical carbon, an essential ingredient used in steelmaking, critical and rare earth minerals for the electrification market, and reprocessed metal to be recycled. American Resources has a growing portfolio of operations located in the Central Appalachian basin of eastern Kentucky and southern West Virginia where premium quality metallurgical carbon and rare earth mineral deposits are concentrated.

American Resources has established a nimble, low-cost business model centered on growth, which provides a significant opportunity to scale its portfolio of assets to meet the growing global infrastructure and electrification markets while also continuing to acquire operations and significantly reduce their legacy industry risks. Its streamlined and efficient operations are able to maximize margins while reducing costs.

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