Korea Zinc's Project Crucible fills critical gap in US minerals supply chain

Korea Zinc Chairman Choi Yun-birm was a relatively small player among the Korean business leaders who gathered in Washington last year for a presidential summit, which included much larger groups such as Samsung, SK and Hyundai Motor Group. But Choi brought something increasingly relevant to Washington: critical minerals. Rather than focusing primarily on investment or manufacturing, Korea Zinc highlighted its decades of experience in refining a wide range of non-ferrous metals and recovering multiple critical minerals from raw materials and smelting byproducts — a capability that addresses a key weakness in the U.S. critical minerals supply chain: limited domestic processing capacity. Four months later, Korea Zinc unveiled Project Crucible, a proposed $7.4 billion integrated smelter and critical minerals processing facility in Tennessee, backed by the U.S. government and private investors. The facility is designed to produce 12 types of nonferrous metals, including 11 designated as critical minerals by the U.S. government, as well as semiconductor-grade sulfuric acid. Production is sc