Torngat Metals’ rare earths project revival aims to create ‘a new industry in Canada’ CEO says

[Redator]

When Torngat Metals secured C$165 million ($120m) in government funding last month for pre-construction work at its Strange Lake rare earth project straddling northern Quebec and Labrador, it set the new company on a strong trajectory.

Export Development Canada (EDC) is supplying a C$110 million bridge loan while the Canada Infrastructure Bank is offering a C$55 million infrastructure loan, both firsts for the institutions.

Production of rare earths, which are essential components of industrial  technologies, is dominated by China. There are no rare earth mines in Canada and only one in the United States — MP Materials’ Mountain Pass in California. 

Strange Lake stands out among North American rare earth projects for its heavy rare earth content, particularly dysprosium and terbium—elements critical to permanent magnets used in electric vehicles, wind turbines and defence technologies. 

With more than half of Strange Lake’s output to be classed as heavy rare earths, this would make it the largest heavy rare earth producer in North America and one of the largest outside China.

An initial study by Quest Rare Minerals pegged indicated resources at Strange Lake’s main B-zone deposit at 278.1 million tonnes at 0.93% total rare earth oxides (TREO); 1.92% zirconium oxide and 0.18% niobium pentoxide. Inferred resources were 214.4 million tonnes of 0.85% TREO, 1.71% zirconium oxide and 0.14% niobium pentoxide.

CEO Yves Leduc is new to the mining industry, but is a veteran of the  manufacturing industry, and he recognized the need to build separation and refining capabilities – domestic and accessible  – as crucial to the project’s success. 

Paramount to Torngat’s plan is to build a rare earth separation plant at Sept-Îles, Quebec, producing finished oxides domestically rather than exporting concentrates.

“I don’t know how the importance of the announcement has sunk in – this is the first time EDC did something like that, issuing financing more than a year before permits,”  Leduc told MINING.com in an interview.

“We’re right now in development and execution mode. It’s not an exploration company anymore. The deposit is confirmed. I’m from the manufacturing world – and half the project is building the separation plant.” 

“When you start adding everything up and it’s the deepest, densest deposit of heavy rare earth outside China, it has the potential of being a true mine-to-magnet value chain inside Canada, which is not going to be seen outside China for decades,” Leduc said.  

“The mandate is a lot more than economic or financial– It’s about creating a new industry in Canada that’s so vital to the energy transition that it will actually create a lever, a strategic lever in the geopolitical arena for Canada and Quebec that is unseen before.” 

“And so Canada suddenly has a Trump card, no pun intended –  that is powerful.”

Leduc said the company is prioritizing environmental, social and governance metrics, and community outreach has begun. Torngat is also opening up shareholder opportunities to Indigenous communities. 

“It has to be so that we do it impeccably right, that we develop the North in ways unseen before, that we respect the environment by investing in protecting the environment in ways nobody has before,” he said.  

Strange Lake project on US radar  

Leduc said that while the Canadian government, both provincial and federal, is aware of the importance of the project, awareness about the strategy – to establish domestic supply –  has been higher in the US than it was in Canada. 

China’s dominance of the critical mineral industry is seen as a key point of leverage for Beijing in its trade war with US President Donald Trump.

China’s decision in April to suspend exports of a wide range of rare earths and related magnets upended the supply chains central to automakers, aerospace manufacturers, semiconductor companies and military contractors around the world.

“It’s a crisis of national proportions in the US, and I think here it’s an opportunity that’s equally intense,” Leduc said.  “In the US., it’s more than known. Torngat is seen as the solution in the heavy rare earth shortage crisis.” 

 A US investor is Cerberus Capital, one of the top private equity firms in the US, which has $80 billion in assets under management, and set up a $2 billion fund called the Supply Chain Fund internally, focused on addressing American vulnerabilities from a supply chain point of view in several different industries.

“Under the umbrella of social acceptability, usually we talk about the environment, Indigenous communities. But these days, social acceptability also involves answering ‘why do you have American capital here?’ And my answer is I should be proud of having American capital,” Leduc said.  “Without the Americans, no one would have dared finance Torngat two years ago.”

“I think there’s going to be a commonality of interest very soon because we all have the same goal here – to make those rare earth oxides available to the market as soon as possible.” 

Torngat is using the EDC funding to complete its pre-feasibility study, and plans to file its environmental assessment to the federal ministry at the end of the year.

The C$2 billion capex project aims to produce roughly 15,000 tonnes per year of rare earth oxides. Torngat aims to begin construction in late 2026 and to start operations by 2028.