ERI and ReElement Partner to Recycle Rare Earths

ERI and ReElement Technologies have formed a strategic partnership to recover and refine rare earth elements from end-of-life electronics.

ERI will aggregate and pre-sort feedstock at its Fresno and Plainfield sites—starting with smart watches, earbuds, speakers and small hard drives—then ship material to ReElement for processing. ReElement is expanding its footprint with a 400,000-square-foot Marion, Indiana facility slated for early 2026 and already operates a 700-square-meter commercial qualification plant in Noblesville.

ReElement’s process converts end-of-life magnets into an aqueous solution and uses chromatographic separation on densely packed resin columns to produce magnet-grade rare earth oxides and critical battery elements, avoiding traditional solvent-extraction hydrometallurgy. The Marion plant is projected to produce up to 9,000 metric tons of purified rare earth oxides annually from recycled inputs and ores.

Partners are optimizing how much disassembly ERI performs versus downstream processing by ReElement to balance logistics and economics. The tie-up supports U.S. efforts to build a circular, domestic supply chain for critical minerals—95–98% of some rare earths currently end up in landfills—and aligns with recent U.S. strategic capital commitments boosting domestic magnet and refining capacity.

Both firms plan international aggregation expansion and say collaboration and scale are essential to lower costs and increase supply security for technologies from EVs to data centers.