Developing a market for scandium oxide
Inside the metallurgical complex in Sorel-Tracy, Quebec, where a new scandium demonstration plant is being built. Credit: Rio Tinto.
If you blinked you might have missed the news last week but it was extraordinary:
Rio Tinto (NYSE: RIO; LSE: RIO) and the Quebec government announced they are building a commercial-scale demonstration plant to produce scandium oxide in Canada – the first scandium oxide plant in North America.
As Alisha Hiyate, the editor-in-chief of the Canadian Mining Journal and Diamonds in Canada magazine pointed out in her article about the new plant on Jan. 14, scandium oxide is used to make high-performance aluminium alloys for the aerospace, defence and 3-D printing industries, and in the production of solid oxide fuel cells. Scandium-enriched alloys are stronger, lighter, corrosion-resistant and weldable.