Wyoming Opens Dual Mine: Coal for Power, Rare Earths for Everything Else

Ramaco Resource’s Rare Earths Project will extract a relatively small amount of coal but the mine is loaded with minerals that domestic industry now imports.

Ramaco Resources plans to extract more than 450 tons of rare earths from its 4,500-acre Brook Mine near Ranchester, Wyom., where graders, conveyors, and sifters were quiet on July 11, 2025, during the mine’s ceremonial ribbon-cutting at the companies nearby offices and labs. John Haughey/The Epoch Times

RANCHESTER, Wyo.—A mine in Wyoming is drawing national attention to what is otherwise a high plains flyspeck with a single gas station, dollar store, and four bars along the Tongue River.

Tumbling out of the Bighorn Mountains, Brook Mine will be the first new coal mine to open in Wyoming in 50 years as well as the first critical mineral and rare earth mine to open in the United States in more than 70 years. Miner Ramaco Resources is to produce at least 2 million tons of coal a year for electricity and extract more than 450 tons of elements annually.