Companies in the rare earth and critical minerals spheres are proliferating in the Austin suburbs
By Justin Sayers – Senior Staff Writer, Austin Business Journal
Jan 13, 2025
A company that recycles critical minerals with the goal of reintroducing theminto the domestic supply chain for use by electric vehicle makers, the aerospacesector and others has secured financial incentives for a research-and-designoutpost in Cedar Park.
Louisiana-based Elementus Minerals LLC — better known as ElementUSA — wasapproved by the Cedar Park City Council on Jan. 9 for a $300,000 performance-based grant and potentially another $510,000 to open the state-of-the-art lab
and critical resource accelerator at 1200 BMC Drive. The facility, which the company plans to move into over the next few months, is expected to create at least 28 jobs with an average salary of $145,000. ElementUSA is a joint venture between DADA Holdings, which is the principal owner of New Day Aluminum, and Enervoxa, a Canadian green technologies company. ElementUSA extracts minerals such as iron, alumina and rare
earth elements from residual bauxite at various sites. It’s a process that canreduce lead times, provide cost-competitive minerals and bolster the domesticsupply chain.
Dan Byrne, chief investment officer at ElementUSA and a partner at DADAHoldings, said the company was born out of an effort to find a way to extractcritical minerals from the tailings of iron. The accelerator — essentially a sistercompany — will provide a lab for testing and analysis and for development ofprocesses on the iron extraction, as well as processes for extraction of mineralsfrom other tailings, such as coal ash or steel waste.
“If those are successful — or I will say, optimistically, when those are successful— any commercial-scale facilities to attack those problems would then be builtback at the site where those tailings actually reside,” Byrne said.
Cedar Park was selected after the company waded through responses fromseveral states and cities to its request for proposals. Byrne said the companywas familiar with the city already because DADA Holdings is a big investor inCedar Park-based rocket maker Firefly Aerospace Inc. He lauded Cedar Park forhow it has cut red tape for businesses and fostered a strong culture for startups,but also for its central U.S. location and proximity to talent.
“Through (the Firefly investment) we’ve really come to appreciate and reallybeen impressed with how Cedar Park welcomes in businesses and really setsthem up for success,” Byrne said. “Cedar Park welcomes bold, brave companieslike ElementUSA to come and cut its teeth and is there to be supportive.”
The company in 2021 announced that the state of Louisiana had approved $850 million in tax-exempt bonds to help finance construction of its first facility, and it also raised what it called “significant equity” from JV partners. In addition, it announced in 2023 that it was in the process of applying for a Department of Energy loan for a commercial-scale facility. Byrne said the company hasn’t encountered significant hurdles in ramping up the Cedar Park site, which the company is aiming to move into during this
year’s first quarter and have fully operational by the second quarter.
“There’s more hoops to jump through to get things done, so that slows theprocess a little bit. But that’s more of a lengthier diligence than really achallenge,” Byrne said.
The incentives agreement — codenamed “Project Mineral Transfer” — with ElementUSAAccelerator Inc. provides the company $300,000 in performancebased grants in exchange for the hiring of 28 full-time employees and $7.2 million in investment at the site. The company will receive $75,000 if it signs a lease by Dec. 31, 2025, and hires
the first three employees; another $75,000 for having 19 full-time employeesand making $4.5 million in investment by Dec. 31, 2026; and $150,000 forreaching 28 employees and investing another $2.7 million at the site by Dec. 31,2027, according to city council documents.
ElementUSA is also eligible to receive $10,000 for every employee who buys ahome in Cedar Park, up to $500,000, and a $10,000 membership to the CedarPark Chamber of Commerce, according to the documents.
Arthur Jackson, Cedar Park’s chief economic development officer, previouslysaid the city has been working with ElementUSA since June after the companyconducted a lengthy multistate search that included other nearby cities. He saidthe company’s lab and accelerator would promote research, lead to the hiringof chemical engineers and include a research and workforce partnership withthe University of Texas.
“As we all know, rare earth minerals are increasingly significant to nationalsecurity due to their critical role in advanced technology and defenseapplications,” Jackson said during the Jan. 9 meeting. “Today the U.S. reliesalmost entirely on other countries for rare earth elements supply. This facilityright here in Cedar Park will be at the forefront in helping our countryaddress this.”
Jackson said ElementUSA is negotiating a sublease at the location, whichcurrently is the 150,000-square-foot home of Hyliion Holdings Corp. Hyliion isin the midst of a business restructuring, and a marketing brochure shows that26,000 square feet is available for sublease through April 2027.
He also addressed concerns about potential contaminations from the location, saying that since it will be a research-and-design facility, it will only use trace amounts of chemicals and has a plan to truck contaminated water off-site. He said the company met with city development services and fire department staff and no concerns were raised. Jackson estimated the incentives would provide a 9% rate on return, meaning
the payments would be recouped in a little more than 10 1/2 years. He said theproject would result in $633,356 in net benefits for the city, county and schooldistrict over the course of the agreement.
Council members passed the proposal unanimously.
“I think this is exactly the kind of business we see having a bright future inCedar Park and ensures our own bright future as we apply new innovation tosolve the world’s most serious problems,” Cedar Park Mayor Jim Penniman-Morin said during the meeting.
Cedar Park, located about 20 miles northwest of Austin, is becoming somethingof a corporate hub. It serves as the headquarters for high-tech companies suchas Firefly Aerospace Inc., Hyliion and several companies in the semiconductorsupply chain. With about 78,000 residents, it’s also become a hot spot forentrepreneurs and entertainment venues like the H-E-B Center, and it’sattracting large-scale retail projects such as the Nebraska Furniture Martmixed-use project.
Companies in the rare earth and critical minerals spheres have beenproliferating in the Austin suburbs. Amermin LLC, an Austin-based recyclingcompany that takes waste generated by industries like oil, gas and aerospaceand then refines it into critical materials, is working on a big project in BurnetCounty. Noveon Magnetics Inc., which makes rare earth magnets, is buildingout a space in San Marcos.
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