Rio Tinto has assembled a team of climate innovation and research leaders to explore new approaches in carbon mineralization technology as a way to safely and permanently store carbon as rock. Rio Tinto will contribute $4 million in funding for the three-year project, in addition to the funding from the DOE’s ARPA-E Innovation Challenge.

Tamarack is a nickel, copper and cobalt project located in central Minnesota that is currently progressing toward feasibility studies. The project is managed by Rio Tinto’s joint venture partner Talon Metals, which holds a 51% share and has a right to earn-in to acquire up to 60%. The Tamarack Nickel Project includes a large bowl of what is known as porous ultramafic rock.

While this bowl sits outside the resource of nickel and other battery minerals, it has the potential to safely store hundreds of millions of tons of carbon in solid form through natural reactions. The project will include laboratory studies and field work to confirm the carbon storage potential of the site, understand the area’s hydrology and assess different carbon mineralization technologies, developing a roadmap by 2025 to guide decisions on implementation.

The Tamarack site is also planned to host the first deployment of climate technology startup Carbon Capture’s innovative Direct Air Capture technology, which captures carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and offers a potential supply source of carbon for mineralization. Rio Tinto has invested $4 million in Carbon Capture to support the development of its technology and feasibility studies for the deployment at Tamarack are now under way.

Rio Tinto is also partnering with Carbfix to help deliver the world’s first carbon mineral storage hub in Iceland and implement carbon capture and mineral storage at the ISAL aluminum smelter.