GRAND FORKS — An effort to commercialize rare earth element research at the University of North Dakota is being worked on alongside a new partnership between the UND College of Engineering and Mines Research Institute and a company in Bulgaria.

Daniel Laudal, executive director of the institute, said the institute aims to pursue funding the Department of Energy recently announced it would be giving out for things within the rare earth elements space, in particular to create commercial demonstrations of critical materials and rare earth element extraction for industrial practices.

“We think we’re in a good position to be competitive and we’re hopeful we’ll be able to bring in quite a bit of federal funding to build the first project here in the state,” he said. “We’re very hopeful that, w

See Full Page