Purdue University was recently in the metals and mining news for advancing technology to efficiently extract rare earth metals from coal ash waste which the US produces almost 130 millions tons of every year. Following the bankruptcy of Molycorp in 2015, we have be more dependent than ever on China to supply these elemental metals that are critical to so many of our high tech industries. Just like we love to tout our "pee-free" gadolinium ingots, all of our rare earth metals are also "ash-free", at least until Purdue can ramp up production. Then we hope they'll favor their alumni in planning their distribution channels:
https://www.rwmmint.com/blogs/news/84645508-now-thats-a-lot-of-pee-water-err-sea-water
Go Boilers!