The Dominican Republic’s ambitious prospective rare earth mining project in Pedernales remains in the early technical and exploratory stages, with multiple critical milestones still to complete before any commercial extraction can begin, according to senior leadership at the state-owned Dominican Mining Company (Emidom).
In an interview with local outlet Acento, Emidom Vice President Miguel Díaz clarified that the 150 million-ton deposit figure previously announced by President Luis Abinader serves only as an initial geological baseline, not a confirmed exploitable reserve. Under both domestic mining regulations and the widely accepted international NI 43-101 standard for mineral project reporting, a deposit can only be classified as an exploitable reserve after rigorous technical and economic validation. “Under the regulation, the material whose viability is demonstrated by these studies is declared a reserve, and on that basis an industry is built,” Díaz noted.
Located within the Ávila Mining Fiscal Reserve, the project is advancing under the oversight of Emidom’s board of directors, with all assessments aligned to global industry reporting requirements. While the ore quality has been backed by analysis of more than 5,000 samples processed at international laboratories, major unresolved questions remain. Emidom has not yet settled on a metallurgical processing method tailored to the deposit, which is a unique karst bauxite formation with distinct mineralogical properties. The company is currently testing potential processing routes on a pilot scale, and is holding technical exchanges with laboratories, research institutions and technology providers across multiple countries to identify the optimal approach. Selection of any technology or project partners will be guided by transparency, legal compliance and alignment with Dominican national interests, Díaz emphasized.
To date, the company has also not finalized any definitive figures for total investment costs, nor has it estimated per-ton extraction and processing expenses. Díaz noted that these calculations are contingent on the outcome of resource certification and processing route selection, both of which will feed into a full feasibility study that will ultimately determine the project’s commercial viability. “To announce a number before that study would be to report without evidence,” he said.
Beyond technical and economic validation, the project also includes capacity building for the Dominican Republic: the national program includes expanding domestic analytical capabilities and training a cohort of specialized local personnel to support rare earth separation and processing. Infrastructure for the operation will only be sized once technical results are finalized, and any development will adhere to strict environmental and social standards set by Emidom’s board.
Unlike many competing rare earth projects that focus solely on extraction, Emidom’s current framework for the Pedernales deposit plans to integrate full processing of rare earths and other critical minerals, with development aligned to circular economy principles that maximize value from all extracted material.
Emidom confirmed it is currently working in line with the official project timeline, but declined to provide specific dates for the completion of studies or the potential launch of commercial operations, noting it will only publicize updates once they are backed by solid technical evidence.
Addressing broader geopolitical context, Energy and Mines Minister Joel Santos clarified that the project sits roughly 30 kilometers from Pedernales’ major tourist areas, and pushed back against framing the Dominican project as part of global geopolitical competition for critical mineral access, particularly against the backdrop of China’s dominant position in the global rare earth market. “We don’t have to get involved in any battle. We are a sovereign country, and we work in the best interests of the Dominican Republic,” Santos said. He added that it remains too early to lock in a long-term exploitation model for the project, as all major decisions will wait for the results of ongoing technical and economic feasibility assessments.