Toronto-based metals recycler Cyclic Materials has secured U.K. vehicle salvaging company Synetiq as its first supplier outside North America, receiving motors from hybrid and electric vehicles to extract the rare earth metals within the parts.

Synetiq “is well-situated in the U.K.” and “a major player” because of the number of scrap yards it owns, Kunal Phalpher, senior vice-president of corporate development at Cyclic, told Sustainable Biz Canada in an interview.

Using its technologies that can shred objects and separate the rare earth metals such as neodymium for reuse in electric and hybrid vehicle motors, wind turbines, MRI machines and electronics, Cyclic looks to bring circularity to a variety of industries.

Rather than mine more metals and rely on China for a large segment of the rare earth supply chain, Phalpher said recycling can reduce sourcing from environmentally damaging mining and onshore or "friendshore" the industry.

Having recently opened its Hub100 pilot plant in Kingston, Ont., the company is inching toward domestic and international commercialization and another fundraise, the Cyclic senior vice-president disclosed.

“We want to expand into Europe, and there are very few solutions like ours out there.”

Partnering with Synetiq

Based in Yorkshire, Synetiq will send vehicle scrap from the U.K. to Cyclic, where the company will process the motors at its pilot facilities in Kingston.

“Our core goal is to feed our future commercial plants, so acquiring as much feedstock as possible is a core part of the strategy,” Phalpher said.

Cyclic starts with its Mag-Cycle process that shreds the motors, rotors and magnets, and separates the rare earth metals from other metals such as copper. The recovered rare earth metals are refined into a chemical raw product such as mixed rare earth oxides or cobalt-nickel hydroxides using REEPure, which can be introduced to the supply chain by being sold to end users.

The paired technologies reduce carbon emissions and water use in comparison to traditional mining and metals refining because less energy- and water-intensive activity is needed, Phalpher explained.

Its Hub100 site, which hosts REEPure, can currently process 100 tonnes of magnet materials, and is scalable to 4,000 tonnes of processing per year. The Mag-Cycle facility, called a ‘Spoke’, is designed to process 8,000 tonnes of products per year, and scale up by eight times at commercialization.

Phalpher said the amount of scrap motors Synetiq will provide to Cyclic will fluctuate, so an expected figure on how much the company will receive will not be possible to forecast.

The partnership will allow Cyclic to receive feedstock until it can open its own facilities in Europe, he continued.

Commercialization for Cyclic

Phalpher said the plan for Cyclic to grow into the market revolves around scaling up in the next 12 to 18 months, likely in Canada. Facilities with Mag-Cycle and REEPure will be created.

Once it has grown in Canada, the goal is to explore expansion in the U.S. and Europe during the next 18 to 24 months.

The company closed a $27-million Series A fundraise in 2023, and received an investment from Microsoft’s Climate Innovation Fund earlier this year.

Cyclic announced it is developing a technology to recover rare earth metals from hard drives in relation to the Microsoft investment.

The company expects to close a Series B fundraise later this year, Phalpher said.

“(There's a) lot of activity and pace to the company as we’re really a first mover in this space. There’s a lot of material out there in scrapyards, in people’s drawers, in data centres that we can create value from.”