Federal Natural Resources minister Greg Rickford wants to develop technology to extract the chromite at the Ring of Fire in a cost effective way. To that end he’s created a $23-million fund for agencies that fall under his department to do just that. Chromite is currently mined in other countries. But Rickford says Canada wants to raise the bar on how the ore is removed and separated from the ground. The $23-millon fund was announced in Tuesday’s federal budget. In addition to extracting chromite, the new technology would also use be used to separate rare earth elements from other minerals.
