A U.S. critical minerals company has recently confirmed the nation’s largest known tungsten resource at its Railroad Valley Minerals Project in Nye County, Nevada, despite a NASA land withdrawal restricting exploration across part of the site.
In its updated resource report, 3 Proton Lithium (3PL) said that the project hosts an inferred resource of 1.78 million tons of tungsten. The company revealed that the deposit is part of a mineral system that also contains world-class resources of lithium, potash, and boron.
As per 3PL, the deposit is reportedly five times larger than the biggest tungsten resource currently listed in the US and comes at a time when the country relies heavily on imports for the strategic metal. Its in-situ value is estimated at about USD 152 billion based on current market prices.
However, exploration across approximately 17 square miles of the project remains restricted by a NASA land withdrawal. The space agency uses the area to calibrate satellite instruments. It says mining could interfere with the facility’s operations.
Multiple critical minerals
The report also confirmed another 31 million tons of measured lithium carbonate equivalent, 533 million tons of measured potash, and 87 million tons of measured borate minerals within the same salt complex. Combined, the resources feature an estimated in-ground value of USD 3.5 trillion.
At current consumption rates, the resources could provide the U.S. with tungsten for hundreds of years, 3PL said. The Railroad Valley project spans approximately 39,000 acres and covers an extensive sodium-rich salt basin in eastern Nevada.
The updated assessment is based on four deep exploration wells, historical data from 290 oil wells, more than 2,500 laboratory analyses, and roughly 42,000 feet of examined drill core and cuttings.
Ten of the basin’s 37 identified geological layers have been fully evaluated so far, with the reported measured resources located within those sections. Additional resources could be identified as the remaining layers are assessed.
“We now have a measured, world-class deposit of multiple critical minerals in one basin and the one discovery that surprised even us is tungsten,” Kevin Moore, 3PL CFO and Chairman, highlighted. “This is a metal the US stopped mining a decade ago and now imports while China controls and manipulates the global market.”
Exploration hits barrier
The Railroad Valley minerals occur as dissolved salts between 1,200 and 2,800 feet underground. The company plans to recover them with solution mining, a process that pumps fluids underground to dissolve minerals before bringing them to the surface for processing.
However, this would require surface facilities covering about 80 acres, eliminating the need for large open pits, waste rock storage, as well as acid processing plants commonly associated with traditional mining operations.
Additionally, the firm also plans to produce sodium carbonate and sodium sulfate from naturally occurring sodium-rich brine. It intends to sell the products and use them in its own extraction process to help reduce operating costs.
The project has a FAST-41 Transparency designation, a federal program intended to speed up permitting for nationally significant infrastructure projects. However, a long-standing NASA land withdrawal continues to limit the development of the project.
About 17 square miles of the site were withdrawn from mining and exploration in 2023 at the space agency’s request in order to protect a satellite calibration area in the Nevada desert.
Meanwhile, 3PL is seeking to reverse the NASA land withdrawal and argues that the restriction was imposed before the full extent of the tungsten resource was understood. “To find more of it here than anywhere, alongside large, measured lithium, potash, and boron at world-class grade, is not a mining story,” Moore concluded in a press release. “It is a national security story.”