Neometals has deepened European institutional backing for its Finnish Vanadium Recovery project, securing a third tranche of funding, this time from EU-sponsored EIT RawMaterials, to keep technical work moving while project financing is stitched together.
The Berlin-based raw materials group has committed an additional €1.5 million (A$2.65m) to Novana Oy, the project company developing the vanadium recovery project in the port of Pori, Finland, lifting its cumulative investment following earlier injections in September 2024 and February 2025.
The fresh capital is earmarked for technical work programs aimed at improving project economics and supporting the financing process, including piloting a beneficiation step designed to lift feed grades and reduce both operating and capital costs.
For Neometals, the timing matters. The EIT RawMaterials funding lands just weeks after the Finnish government, through Business Finland, approved a €48.7 million (A$86.15m) conditional grant for the project.
That grant, coupled with EIT RawMaterials’ ongoing support, meaningfully reduces the equity burden for giant development targeting Europe’s first domestic production of high‑purity vanadium.
The project is being advanced by Novana, a wholly owned subsidiary of Recycling Industries Scandinavia AB, in which Neometals holds an 86.1 per cent interest.
Novana is commercialising Neometals’ patent‑pending vanadium recovery process to extract vanadium from steelmaking slag. This industrial side stream avoids conventional mining and underpins the project’s recycling and low‑carbon credentials.
The Vanadium recovery project already carries environmental approval, a long‑term site lease and a binding offtake agreement with Glencore International, signed up to take 100 per cent of planned vanadium pentoxide production.
A completed feasibility study has outlined its lowest‑quartile operating costs and a low‑to‑negative carbon footprint, placing the project firmly in the EU’s critical minerals crosshairs.
Neometals Managing Director Christopher Reed said: “We welcome the continued support of EIT RawMaterials through this third round of investment to maintain the ongoing technical work programs in parallel with the project financing process. The principal application of funds is the piloting a novel beneficiation process to increase the feed grade which has the potential to significantly reduce both operating and capital costs.”
EIT RawMaterials’ involvement goes beyond writing cheques. The group, mandated by the European Commission to lead the European Raw Materials Alliance, has now invested in Novana three times and holds a small equity position, with a proposed option to increase its stake over time.
The latest funding package also includes a non‑binding term sheet that would allow EIT RawMaterials to subscribe for additional shares in the project vehicle under certain conditions.
Neometals has made it clear it does not plan to pour much of its own capital into the Finnish build. Instead, management expects its equity stake to dilute as third-party funding is locked in, while preserving upside through a 2.5 per cent gross revenue royalty on all products sold using its vanadium recovery technology.
That capital-light approach was reinforced earlier this year when the company exited its lithium-ion battery recycling JV, Primobius. The move delivered upfront cash and a capped royalty stream, while cutting loose future funding obligations in what has become a tough battery metals market.
Together, the reset has sharpened Neometals’ focus on two clear company priorities of licensing its processing technologies across critical minerals and chasing nearer-term cashflow opportunities closer to home.
In Western Australia, Neometals has been steadily advancing the company’s Barrambie gold assets, recently signing a letter of intent with a Kalgoorlie mining contractor to negotiate a production joint venture at its Ironclad gold deposit.
Ironclad hosts a modest but shallow inferred gold resource and sits within trucking distance of several third‑party mills, offering a potential low‑capex pathway to production. At the same time, broader exploration continues across the Barrambie greenstone belt.
For now, however, Europe is doing the heavy lifting. With Brussels‑mandated institutions, a Finnish state grant and a global commodities major already locked in, the Pori vanadium project is edging closer to the point where funding risk gives way to execution risk.
That shift is often where projects start to separate the talkers from the builders. If the remaining pieces fall into place, Neometals’ Finnish bet could soon move from policy‑backed promise to poured concrete and turning steel.
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By Doug Bright
