Gary Palmer's Legislation to Recover Critical Minerals Passes House Committee

The House Energy and Commerce Committee has passed the bipartisan H.R. 9617, the Coordinating and Harnessing America's Recovery of Minerals (CHARM) Act, aimed at strengthening national security by reducing reliance on foreign, particularly Chinese, critical minerals. The legislation, introduced by Reps. Gary Palmer (R-Hoover) and Paul Tonko (D-New York), directs the EPA to develop a federal strategy for recovering these essential resources from domestic sources like electronic waste, legacy mine sites, and coal ash.

"Critical minerals are essential to our economy and national security, yet America remains too dependent on China for these resources," said Rep. Palmer. "The CHARM Act takes a commonsense approach by directing the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to develop a coordinated federal strategy to identify new opportunities to recover critical minerals from electronic waste, legacy mine sites, coal ash, and other overlooked sources already here at home. I appreciate Congressman Tonko's partnership and thank my colleagues on the Energy and Commerce Committee for advancing this legislation."

To read the bill:

https://www.congress.gov/119/bills/hr9617/BILLS-119hr9617ih.pdf

Recycling critical minerals from coal ash and electronic waste relies on breaking down solid materials through advanced acid leaching, ionic liquids, or microwave heating. These methods dissolve and separate valuable elements at the molecular level, allowing facilities to bypass traditional, environmentally hazardous mining.

Extracting Minerals from Coal Ash

Coal ash contains microscopic, yet highly valuable, quantities of rare earth elements (REEs) like neodymium and dysprosium.

You can read more on Rep. Palmer's official website.