The company announced it will defer completing the facility's rare earth hydrometallurgical leaching, purification and rare earth precipitation circuits until 2024.

Privately-owned Broadmind Mining says the company had started assessing the economic viability of the Eisenberg deposit.

In the case of rare earths, Germany is more than 90% dependent on supplies from China.

Highlights from the program include 36.11 wt.% total rare earth oxides at Alces Lake in Saskatchewan.

Hancock Prospecting took around half of a A$121 million placement by Arafura last week aimed at raising capital to develop the Nolans rare earths project.

Dubbo site contains light and heavy rare earths, zirconium, niobium and hafnium.