Testing reveals five permanent magnet REEs in America’s largest graphite deposit.
America’s largest deposit of graphite could also be an important source of the rare earth elements essential to automotive, defense, and high-tech manufacturing, according to new testing of garnet-rich zones running through Graphite One Inc.’s Graphite Creek deposit in western Alaska.
In April, Graphite One finalized a Pentagon-supported feasibility study detailing plans for a financially robust mine at Graphite Creek and a processing plant in Ohio. The study outlines a 20-year operation producing 175,000 metric tons of graphite annually. The deposit considered for this mine only accounts for about 12% of a roughly 10-mile-long trend of graphite- and garnet-bearing mineralized zone identified at the project.
Now, new analyses of garnet-bearing schist within the planned pit area reveal elevated levels of five of the rare earths used in powerful permanent magnets – neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium, terbium, and samarium – along with scandium and yttrium used in high-performance alloys.
“Garnets are known for their ability to uptake heavy rare earths and yttrium into their mineral structure,” said Graphite One Chief Geologist Kirsten Fristad.
The rare earths found within the deposit, which are essential for the magnets used in electric vehicles, wind turbines, and precision-guided munitions, elevate Graphite Creek to a potential polymetallic source of six of the elements on the final 2025 critical minerals list published by the U.S. Geological Survey last week.
“Given the robust economics of our planned complete graphite materials supply chain, the presence of rare earths at Graphite Creek suggests that recovery as a by-product to our graphite production will maximize the value,” said Graphite One President Anthony Huston.
The discovery of rare earths within the Graphite Creek deposit comes at a time when the U.S. is seeking to diversify its supply of these tech elements away from China, which accounts for roughly 70% of global rare earth mining and around 90% of rare earth processing and magnet making.
China, which also happens to supply approximately 80% of the world’s graphite, has placed government-controlled restrictions on the exports of both rare earths and graphite – elevating the importance of the discovery of rare earths in a domestic deposit currently being permitted for mine development.
“The presence of two Defense Production Act (DPA) Title III materials – graphite and REEs – in a single deposit further underscores Graphite Creek’s position as a truly generational deposit,” Huston said.
Having six minerals highly critical to America’s economy and national security could attract further backing from the Pentagon, which provided Graphite One with $37.5 million in DPA Title III funding to accelerate the completion of the work needed for the feasibility study.
Now, the U.S. Department of War has been allocated $7.5 billion, via the Trump administration’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, for critical mineral supply chain investments and expanding the National Defense Stockpile.
A shovel-ready project in Alaska that could provide both graphite and heavy rare earths needed for EVs and essentially every high-tech device used by American consumers and the military would likely land high on the list of critical mineral projects under consideration for Pentagon backing.
To follow up on the discovery of rare earths-enriched garnet zones running through the Graphite Creek deposit, Graphite One is having the University of Alaska Fairbanks’ Advanced Instrumentation Laboratory and Activation Laboratories quantify the amount of rare earths within the current mine plan. At the same time, the company is working with a U.S. Department of Energy National Lab to develop methods to extract and separate the rare earths found in the Graphite Creek ore.
“We will now be adding updates on our rare earth by-product potential,” said Huston.
By Mining News – https://www.miningnewsnorth.com/story/2025/11/14/news/graphite-creek-enriched-with-rare-earths/9358.html