MOSP & DOE collaboration ----- MRT1.DOE/NETL 2017 report" Although Canadian oil sands and wastes have been exten-sively studied for organic and mineral content, there has been little detailed analysis of individual rare earth ele-ments using Inductively Coupled Plasma- Mass Spectrom-etry (ICP-MS). This study adds detailed information on the elemental concentrations of typical waste streams associ-ated with Alberta oil sands and gives direction on which streams would most likely be economic sources of REEs and other metals for recovery and extraction". ------ Ucore, July 26th, 2017; " OIS The oxidized pre-leach input material and post-leach residue material was analyzed by Organic Infrared Spectroscopy (OIS) to measure the relative content of graphic carbon and organic carbon. Preference was given to samples which exhibited the lowest overall carbon content after submission to the Bentzen Process. Based on the analysis, all three samples exhibited a post-leach reduction in carbon content to less than 0.5%, which is the detection limit for OIS testing. ....ICPMS The subject samples were also evaluated by Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (ICPMS) to measure the relative recovery of Total Rare Earth Elements (TREE)". ---------- DOE/NETL 2017 report; " Canadian oil sand and oil sand waste samples were re-ceived from CanmetENERGY..."........ From Suncor---- new technology partner is CanmetENERGY. --------- DOE/NETL; " The solid sample fractions have considerable amounts of REEs, with some fractions being significantly more con-centrated in REEs compared to the oil sand itself on a dry mass basis". ------- Ucore's Kentucky project is sponsored by DOE/NETL. ------------ DOE/NETL; " Table 4 shows a Pearson correlation matrix of major elements with the total rare earths, and indicates that total REEs increase with increasing Zr, Ti, and Fe, and with decreasing Si. A strong correlation does not exist with the total REEs and Na, Mg, and K, indicating that the REEs concentrate with heavy minerals containing Zr and Ti, and are not likely bound in felsic silicates. In addition to REEs, other elements that might provide additional value to these waste streams were also deter-mined. Since companies have already studied wastes from oil sand production for possible extraction of Ti and Zr, it is logical to also look at the concentrations of these elements". ----------- Ucore July 18, 2016 ; " Given the competitive state of world oil markets, liberating high-value commodities such as REE, titanium, scandium, niobium, vanadium, tantalum, and a host of other tech metals, offers the potential to change the economics of the oil sands process. " ---------- Ucore March 6th, 2017; " The Clark Hot Water Process for the extraction of bitumen, for example, has been shown to enrich the concentrations of titanium and zirconium minerals when the froth treatment tailing is subsequently de-sanded and de-watered. The result is an output product consisting of 11.5% TiO2 and 3.40% ZrO2, and recovering about 50% of the TiO2 and 85% of the ZrO2 from the oil sands feed.2 Studies to recover these minerals from the tailing have been in progress some time, with the ultimate goal finalizing a complete metals separation process to produce saleable heavy mineral concentrates from the oil sands tailing.2 MRT represents a prospectively promising methodology for such metals separations, based on performance metrics such as selectivity, recovery, and purity".------------ DOE/NETL;------this is very important. It was Jack Lifton who said in a 2017 PDAC video---- when you get into things like Vanadium....Zirconium.... Hafnium, etc, etc.....the skies the limit ------ " The near perfect correlation of Zr and Hf indicate that Hf is most likely located in the mineral zircon"......" The REE were 4 times more concentrated in the heavy fraction of the sample, while the Ti and Zr were 6 times more concentrated". ------- Conclusions ; Alberta Canada oil sand process streams were analyzed to determine the REE distribution and concentrations. Relatively high concentrations of REEs, Zr, and Ti were found in the oil sand TSRU Tailings, which best represent froth floatation tailings. The high concentrations of REEs, Zr, and Ti indicate that this waste stream from the extrac-tion of bitumen from oil sand could provide a valuable and reliable source of REEs. Size and density separation exper-iments indicated that the REEs, Zr, and Ti concentrated to-gether. The results reported show that relatively high con-centrations of REEs and other potentially valuable ele-ments can be found within waste streams produced during Alberta oil sand production. Future work can focus on fur-ther characterization, extraction, and separation of rare earths and other critical elements from oil sand byprod-ucts, complementing efforts on abundant United States coal byproducts". ------------ U.S. / Canadian collaboration, with MRT right in the middle. --------------------- https://www.osti.gov/pages/servlets/purl/1393393