Funding Notice: Critical Material Innovation, Efficiency, and Alternatives

Office: Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation FOA number: DE-FOA-0003105 Download the full funding opportunity: FedConnect Total Funding Amount: $150,000,000

Background Information

On May 19, 2026, the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation announced $45.7 million for 19 projects that will unleash American energy innovation by addressing and filling domestic critical minerals and materials supply chain gaps. This funding specifically focuses on supporting development of novel technologies that will be used in the production of critical materials by developing pilot-scale facilities for processing magnesium and rare earth minerals elements.

According to the U.S. Geological Survey, more than 95% of the U.S. supply for rare earth elements comes from foreign sources, over 50% of most critical minerals come from foreign sources, and at least 14 critical minerals come exclusively from foreign sources.

DOE’s Critical Material Innovation, Efficiency, and Alternatives funding opportunity is providing federal funding to build a secure domestic supply of critical minerals from sources across the United States, including ore deposits, mine and industrial waste, and recycled materials.

These projects build on an unprecedented surge in federal support for domestic critical minerals supply chains under the Trump Administration. In August 2025, DOE announced a series of funding opportunities totaling nearly $1 billion to advance and scale mining, processing, and manufacturing technologies across key stages of critical minerals and materials supply chains.

Selectees

Pilot-Scale Projects

The following two projects selected for negotiation fall under Area of Interest 1B: Phase II – Pilot scale facility development and construction are focused on pilot-scale processing from a continuous bench-scale operation to kickstart pre-commercial/commercial production.

• USA Rare Earth
• Big Blue Technologies

Next-Generation Technologies

The following seventeen projects selected for negotiation fall under Area of Interest 3: Next Generation Technologies and will develop innovative technologies and practices to diversify commercially viable and sustainable domestic sources of critical materials. These technologies focus on optimizing affordability, environmental emissions, and resource usage or intensity within extraction, production, separation, processing, refining, alloying, manufacturing, or recycling technologies.

• Southwest Research Institute
• Princeton University
• Battelle Memorial Institute
• National Laboratory of the Rockies
• Idaho National Laboratory
• Argonne National Laboratory
• Columbia University
• Ohio University
• The University of North Dakota
• Idaho National Laboratory
• Savannah River National Laboratory
• Iowa State University
• Michigan Technological University
• The University of Idaho
• Texas A&M University
• Vanderbilt University
• Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

Project Selections for FOA 3105

Download the full funding opportunity on FedConnect.