After decades of import reliance, Indium Corporation secures $3.2 million DOE funding to develop domestic gallium recovery for semiconductors, defence and energy technologies.
Indium Corporation has received a $3.2 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Critical Minerals and Energy Innovation (CMEI) to develop a domestic process for recovering high-purity gallium from manufacturing by-products.
The initiative aims to establish a US-based supply chain for gallium, a material critical to semiconductors, advanced electronics, and defence systems.
The funding comes under the DOE’s Technology for Recovery and Advanced Critical-material Extraction–Gallium (TRACE-Ga) programme, which seeks to accelerate domestic gallium production.
The work will take place at Rome, New York, where the company has existing metal-processing infrastructure, analytical facilities, and utilities needed to develop and scale a gallium recovery process.
Indium Corporation is one of five organisations selected to prototype technologies for recovering gallium from US metal-processing feedstocks, addressing the country’s complete reliance on imports following the cessation of domestic production in 1987. It generates gallium-containing scrap in routine production, which the project will convert into high-purity metallic gallium through electrochemical and advanced purification methods.
Gallium is used across technologies central to both economic competitiveness and national security, including GPS, cellular networks, radar systems, electric vehicles, LEDs, solar cells, and semiconductor thermal management.
The TRACE-Ga project will be executed in two phases. Phase 1 involves designing and validating a prototype to reclaim metallic gallium, while Phase 2 will scale the system to produce at least one metric ton per year of 4N-grade (99.99% pure) gallium, with potential for further expansion to meet commercial demand.
DOE’s TRACE-Ga programme is managed by ENERGYWERX under a partnership intermediary agreement, which broadens collaboration with innovative and non-traditional partners to accelerate the development and commercial deployment of critical energy and materials technologies.
Ross Berntson, President and CEO of Indium Corporation, described the project as a key step toward restoring US gallium production.
“Our efforts will support the commercialisation of innovative technologies, strengthen domestic critical minerals production, and advance supply chain independence,” he said.
