TORONTO – The Atmospheric Fund (TAF) is pleased to announce its investment of $1.3 million in Noveon Magnetics, a waste-to-value company that recovers rare earth minerals from electronic waste and reprocesses them into high-quality magnets as part of a larger round led by Toronto-based growth equity firm, Canadian Shield Capital.
Rare earth minerals are key to electrification including for electric vehicles, renewable energy, and energy storage. However, traditional extractive mining has ecological, humanitarian and supply chain issues. Additionally, historic, and pandemic-related trade barriers and supply chain challenges have created significant pricing volatility in the rare earth mineral market. In this context, demand for domestic closed-loop supply of rare earth minerals and magnets is flourishing.
The Noveon process has been optimized and proven at two facilities and TAF’s investment will support expansion, commercialization and bring robust impact measurement and verification expertise to the industry. Through lower manufacturing energy consumption, preventing landfill waste, and minimizing virgin material extraction, the process emits approximately 64-96% less greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions than standard mine-to-magnet production.
TAF has worked strategically with Hatch, a global engineering consulting firm, and Canadian Shield Capital, a prominent growth equity investment firm to advance this investment.
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QUOTES
“We need to ensure that carbon emissions are minimized all along the value chain in order to meet local, national and global climate targets. TAF’s participation in Canadian Shield’s investment in Noveon’s commercial production will help ensure that electric vehicles, wind power and energy storage are low-carbon and insulated from supply chain challenges. We look forward to working with the company and our co-investors to achieve both environmental and financial impact.” – Julia Langer, CEO, The Atmospheric Fund
“Noveon is excited to welcome Canadian Shield Capital, Hatch, and TAF as investors in our recent round of funding. This capital will allow us to complete our first phase of commercial production. As the only manufacturer of rare earth magnets in the U.S., our facility is critical in expanding domestic manufacturing activity for clean technologies. We look forward to drawing on TAF’s experience in impact measurement to quantify and optimize the environmental benefits of our process relative to virgin magnet manufacturing as we continue to expand.” – Scott Dunn, CEO, Noveon
“The completion of Noveon’s initial commercial production capacity in San Marcos, Texas will serve as a critical first step in creating an environmentally sustainable and stable supply chain of rare earth magnets in North America. As a required input to electrification technologies, we believe a North American-based circular rare earth element supply chain can result in a step change toward achieving carbon abatement targets, both through a reduced reliance on mined material and by improving economics for downstream manufacturers. Rapidly growing magnet demand, with electric vehicles as the main driver, and Noveon’s recycling process give the firm enormous runway.” – Andrew W Dunn, Managing Partner, Canadian Shield Capital
“Rare earth magnet supply has long been a pain point in the clean energy space. As volumes of end-of-life material continue to increase, we believe that recycling is a sustainable and economically attractive approach to meeting rising demand. Climate change is a central theme for Hatch and we are excited to be working with Noveon as they commercialize and scale their technology.” – John Bianchini, CEO, Hatch
HIGHLIGHTS
- Neodymium iron boron magnets are a pivotal component of electric vehicles, wind turbines and other clean products and technologies.
- China currently controls 80% of global production of the rare earth magnet market. Shortages, trade barriers and price surges for these magnets will hinder progress towards achieving climate targets.
- Less than 1% of all rare earth materials are recycled from end-of-life products. Rare earth magnet recycling is expected to meet roughly 50% of neodymium and dysprosium demand by 2100.
- Noveon’s magnet-to-magnet production process emits 11 tonnes less GHG emissions per tonne of magnet produced than conventional mine-to-magnet model.
About The Atmospheric Fund
The Atmospheric Fund (TAF) is a regional climate agency that invests in low-carbon solutions for the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area and helps scale them up for broad implementation. We are experienced leaders and collaborate with stakeholders in the private, public and non-profit sectors who have ideas and opportunities for reducing carbon emissions. Supported by endowment funds, we advance the most promising concepts by investing, providing grants, influencing policies and running programs. We’re particularly interested in ideas that offer benefits in addition to carbon reduction such as improving people’s health, creating local jobs, boosting urban resiliency, and contributing to a fair society.
MEDIA CONTACT
Julie Leach, Communications Manager
jleach@taf.ca
416 393 6382
www.taf.ca
