RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:RE:US Needs To Step UpMicahelbarrr has a point, although I believe it is a moot one- retrofitting a plant to produce another metal is possible, it doesn't always take much capital.
Case in point, since kaiwolf asked for one- Formation Capital (later known as eCobalt solutions... which was the major competitor to be first to market with FCC during the cobalt boom), conducted a study to convert one of their existing SX EW (Solvent Extraction Electrowinning) precious metals refineries to produce cobalt. The reverse could also be true where SXEW equipment used for cobalt could be retrofitted to produce a different product.
Mineral processing equipment is pretty common across the board, regardless of the product- what differs is the size of the equipment (based on plant throughput), and the chemicals/solvents/reagents used to promote the extraction of whatever product you're trying to isolate. You could use a solvent extraction tub to promote cobalt or equally silver, or a REE (Rare Earth Element, many of which are ingredients in batteries) you just have different solvents and organics in the tub for either product. You can use the same electrowinning cell to plate copper, gold, silver, etc, it's just the solution in the cell that's different.
So, I believe the FCC refinery could be retrofitted to produce another metal (ironically this plant is not suited to iron, as the poster suggested- iron is a much larger scale, much cruder operation), but I don't believe it would ever be a feasible option. The plant is too small for a precious or base metal (i.e. silver, gold, platinum, copper). They just don't build plants this small anymore. Go big or go home, with these types of metals- the economics of scale. Higher throughput= less$/oz produced.
This would be suited to process REE's as they are much smaller scale operations, but this wouldn't be feasible in my opinionn because REE's would have to be shipped in from quite a distance to be processed (China is 90% of them, California has big deposits too). An REE plant of this size is cheap, as we saw from the study one like this can be built under 100M$, so why spend shipping and processing costs for many years, when you could build your own refinery close to the source. These expenses over life-of-mine would almost certainly cost more than building your own plant.
The FCC plant is well suited to proces the cobalt in the area (Cobalt Camp Ontario), or the cobalt from close-ish in Idaho.
All that being said, I am starting to get cold feet here, as share dilution/consolidation, as well as delays in good news (TM always seems to be repeating the same thing in different words, very tongue in cheek) make me think FCC might have to sell their soul to institutional shareholders or Glencore to get this thing going. Little investors like us always get fleeced in those types of things. If they end up issuing more shares to raise capital or they take out a loan other than what GC has given them, I will be out.