Cyclic Materials to open $25M rare earths plant in Canada

[Ben Graham]

Cyclic Materials, a Canadian startup backed by Amazon and Microsoft, is investing $25 million to build a rare-earths recycling plant and research centre in Kingston, Ontario.

The company has developed proprietary technology that recovers rare earth elements from discarded products such as wind turbines and data-centre hard drives. In 2023, it launched a commercial demonstration facility using this process to extract rare earth magnets. By 2024, it had opened a second facility in Kingston to produce Mixed Rare Earth Oxide (rMREO).

Last year, the federal government awarded Cyclic Materials $4.9 million to build a demonstration facility in Kingston. That project is now complete.

The new 140,000-square-foot Kingston Centre of Excellence will mark the company’s first commercial-scale “Hub” processing unit. It will begin operations in the first quarter of 2026 and is designed to process 500 tonnes of magnet-rich feedstock annually, converting it into rMREO. This recycled product contains critical components such as neodymium, praseodymium, terbium, and dysprosium. These elements are key to manufacturing permanent magnets used in electric vehicle motors, wind turbines and consumer electronics.

“With this Centre of Excellence, we’re advancing our core mission: to secure the most critical elements of the energy transition through circular innovation,”  chief executive Ahmad Ghahreman said. “Kingston is where Cyclic began—and now it’s where we’re anchoring our commercial future.”

Cyclic is also expanding internationally, with a recycling plant under construction in Mesa, Arizona, slated to open in early 2026.

Global demand for rare earths is climbing rapidly, driven by the surge in clean energy and digital technologies. China, the dominant player in the rare earth supply chain, has used its control of exports as leverage in geopolitical disputes, including in response to US tariffs.

While President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday a rare earth supply deal with Beijing, the search for secure and independent sources continues.