Skip to main content

This Could Prevent Wars! Breakthrough Metal Recovery Process | Dr. James Tour

Liberty and Finance Jan 4, 2026

Summary

Flash Metals USA / Mitalium Limited is launching flash Joule heating to reclaim gold, tin, germanium, gallium and rare earths from scrap electronics.

Its Texas facility targets one ton of printed circuit boards per day starting January 2026, scaling to 20 tons per day by September 2026.

The process avoids acids, cyanide and heavy water use, with lifecycle assessments showing 80-90% lower cost and time versus new mining.

The guest says the US government has set baseline prices for reclaimed critical metals, defending against potential Chinese price flooding.

Kaiser Johnson's takeaways

  • Top takeaway Frames the geopolitical stakes around critical metals, noting China has restricted exports of rare earths plus tin, antimony, germanium, gallium, indium, tantalum, and battery-grade graphite.
  • Frames the discussion around a structural metal supply deficit, noting that opening a new mine costs about $200 million and takes 5-10 years versus the multi-decade pace of scaling conventional mining operations and permits.

James Tour's takeaways

  • Top takeaway TOP POINT FIRST: Flash Metals USA (a division of Mitalium Limited, ticker MTMCF) is ramping a pre-permitted facility in Anouac, Texas, being expanded to 90,000 sq ft, with production set to start in January 2026 at one ton of printed circuit boards per day, projected to scale to 20 tons/day by September 2026, initially recovering gold, tin, germanium, and gallium before adding rare earth elements.
  • Describes a flash-heating process that heats material to roughly 3,000 degrees centigrade in under one second and reacts it with chlorine to form volatile metal chlorides (e.g., titanium tetrachloride boils at 136 degrees C vs about 3,000 for titanium metal), enabling sequential distillation of metals from scrap PCBs and mining tailings.
  • Argues critical-metal concentrations in e-waste and tailings are roughly 1,000 times those in mined ores, with data-center PCB turnover (every 1-3 years) supplying large volumes of feedstock; says the process uses no acids, bases, or flocculation methods and produces near-zero secondary waste streams.
  • Energy and cost economics: about $30 per ton in electricity with exothermic reactions, plus plans for rooftop solar arrays and SYNGAS (hydrogen/carbon monoxide) capture from PCB plastics to generate roughly 60% of facility power; reports a life-cycle assessment of 80-90% lower cost and 90% less time versus conventional recovery.
  • Says the U.S. government has committed to baseline prices to insulate the company from Chinese price-dumping, and notes spodumene (5% lithium by weight) can yield lithium chloride in a single flash, sidestepping South American brine evaporation and U.S. deep-well brines (0.25% lithium).