CLARKSVILLE, TN – International representatives from Nyrstar recently traveled from the Netherlands to meet with Clarksville-Montgomery County government officials as well as other community stakeholders.
They discussed their plans to fund an expansion that would process the minerals germanium and gallium here in the US, according to a Nyrstar news release. Currently China has control of most of the market when it comes to these minerals.
Nyrstar owns three operations in the US, all of which are located in Tennessee, with the processing smelter in Clarksville. Many US defense weapons systems depend on these minerals, which are also used for backlighting LEDs for smartphone screens, chips that handle Wi-Fi and Bluetooth as well as other electronic devices, communication applications, electric vehicles and more.
Currently, Tennessee is the only place in the US where gallium and germanium can both be extracted and processed at such high levels, the release said.