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The developer of what would be the first new coal mine in Wyoming in decades is launching a potentially half-billion-dollar effort to extract rare earth metals from the fossil fuel that are crucial for tech products and military hardware.Energy Secretary Chris Wright, Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon, and Wyoming’s congressional delegation took part in a ribbon-cutting ceremony Friday for Ramaco Resources, Inc.’s Brook Mine outside Ranchester in northeastern Wyoming.“Not only do we get coal here, we are going to get those rare earth elements that are going to break our dependence on China,” Wright told Fox News from the mine site Friday.Wright’s involvement underscores President Donald Trump’s determination to advance fossil fuel projects and mining and reverse former President Joe Biden’s moves to support for renewable energy.Administration officials on Monday moved toward selling federal coal leases in the top U.S. coal-producing region in northeastern Wyoming and southeastern Montana. On Thursday, officials announced a proposal in Utah that they said would be the first coal exploration project on U.S. Bureau of Land Management property since 2019.Those moves came on the heels of legislation signed last week that lowered royalty payments for companies mining coal on public lands and mandated officials make available for potential mining an area greater in size than Connecticut.Meanwhile, local officials in Utah hope the administration will support plans to build a railroad spur to boost oil drilling. A coalition of eastern Utah counties wants Trump’s Transportation Department to approve $2.4 billion in bonds for the 88-mile (140-kilometer) spur to export oil from the Uinta Basin, a project that may proceed after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling.On Friday, the minerals capturing the administration’s attention were not just coal but rare earths a family of 17 metallic elements with unusual properties that make them useful in modern technology, from electric car batteries and wind turbines to military targeting devices.The only operating U.S. rare earths mine is at Mountain Pass in California. Nearly all of the nation’s supply comes from China, the source of nearly 90% of the world’s supply.Rare earths aren’t especially rare but so scattered they are difficult to bring together in useful quantities.Concern about continued access to them has been a focus of recent negotiations between China and the U.S., and led the Trump administration to try to encourage more production domestically.“We would intend to mine it here in Wyoming, process it here in Wyoming and sell it to domestic customers including the government,” Ramaco CEO Randall Atkins said Thursday.Former West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, an independent who left office in January after not seeking reelection, joined the Ramaco board in April.The new Brook Mine, though relatively small, offers a glimmer of optimism for Wyoming’s coal industry as potentially the state’s first new coal mine in 50 years. Massive, open-pit mines east of the Brook Mine supply around 40% of the nation’s coal but Wyoming coal mining has shrunk substantially since its peak over a decade ago, as utilities switch to renewable energy and power plants fueled by cheaper natural gas.“Wyoming is moving to meet growing energy demands here at home and internationallywith the recognition that coalWyoming coalis essential to healthy energy portfolios,” Gordon, a Republican, said in a statement after the Brook Mine event.The Brook Mine has been in the works for over a decade, stalled in part by landowners worried about groundwater depletion. Atkins originally envisioned it as a source of subbituminous power plant fuel like the state’s other coal mines.A public company with metallurgical coal mines in Appalachia, Ramaco in recent years received Department of Energy grants to develop coal into carbon-based products such as carbon fiber. This year, it got a $6.1 million grant from Wyoming to build a rare earth and critical minerals processing plant.A consultant report released this week found that fully developing the mine and processing plant to extract rare earths would cost $533 million, a sum that could be recovered in five years if the elements in the coal prove profitable. Ramaco also would sell the processed coal as fuel, Atkins said.Analysis by U.S. national laboratories show the Brook Mine coal contains valuable quantities of the rare earths neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium and terbium, as well as the critical minerals gallium, scandium and germanium, according to a Ramaco letter to shareholders on July 1.Neodymium and dysprosium are used in the permanent magnets of wind turbines, lanthanum in electric and hybrid car batteries. Yttrium and terbium have critical military uses, including in targeting devices. A previous version of this story said Joe Manchin was a Democrat when he left office in January. He was an independent. Mead Gruver, Associated Press
Category:
E-Commerce
Millions of people receive a federal tax deduction for the interest they pay on home loans. Under President Donald Trumps new tax-cut law, many people for the first time also could claim a tax deduction for interest on their vehicle loans. The new tax break will be available even to people who don’t itemize deductions. But there are some caveats that could limit its reach. The vehicles must be new, not used. They must be assembled in the U.S. And the loans must be issued no sooner than this year, to list just a few qualifications. Here are some things to know about the new auto loan interest tax deduction: Candidate Trump promised an auto loan interest tax break Trump pledged while campaigning last year to make interest on car loans tax-deductible. He said it would make car ownership more affordable and stimulate massive domestic auto production. The idea made it into the big tax-cut bill passed by Congress, which Trump signed into law July 4. The law allows taxpayers to deduct up to $10,000 of interest payments annually on loans for new American-made vehicles from 2025 through 2028. It applies to cars, motorcycles, sport utility vehicles, minivans, vans and pickup trucks weighing less than 14,000 pounds, a threshold referred to as light vehicles. But it only applies to vehicles purchased for personal use, not for fleets or commercial purposes. The tax break can be claimed starting on 2025 income tax returns. But the deduction phases out for individuals with incomes between $100,000 and $150,000 or joint taxpayers with incomes between $200,000 and $250,000. Those earning more cannot claim the tax break. Millions of buyers could benefit, but millions of others will not U.S. automobile dealers sold 15.9 million new light vehicles last year, a little over half of which were assembled in the U.S, according to Cox Automotive. It says around 60% of retail sales are financed with loans. After excluding fleet and commercial vehicles and customers above the income cutoff, an estimated 3.5 million new vehicle loans could be eligible for the tax break this year, if purchasing patterns stay the same, said Jonathan Smoke, chief economist at Cox Automotive. It’s the assembly plant, not the automaker’s headquarters that matters The tax break applies to vehicles assembled in the U.S., no matter where the company making them is headquartered. All Tesla vehicles sold in the U.S. are assembled in this country. But so are all Acura brands, the luxury model of Japanese automaker Honda. Last year, 78% of Ford vehicles sold in the U.S. were assembled in this country, according to Cox Automotive. But customers wanting the tax break will need to pay attention to specific models. While the Ford Mustang is assembled in Michigan, the Mustang Mach-E is built in Mexico. General Motors assembles all of its Cadillacs in the U.S. But just 44% of its Chevrolets sold last year were assembled in the U.S., and just 14% of Buicks, according to Cox Automotive. That’s a lower U.S-assembled rate than Honda (60%), Toyota (52%) and Nissan (48%), which all are headquartered in Japan. Taxpayers could save hundreds of dollars a year The average new vehicle loan is about $44,000 financed over six years. Interest rates vary by customer, so the savings will, too. In general, the tax deduction will decline after the initial year, because interest payments on loans are frontloaded while principal payments grow on the back end. At a 9.3% interest rate, an average new vehicle buyer could save about $2,200 on taxes over four years, Smoke said. The tax savings would be less on a loan at 6.5%, which is the rate figured into calculations by the American Financial Services Association, a consumer credit industry trade group. Some people also could see a reduction in state income taxes Whereas the tax deduction for home loan interest can be claimed only by people itemizing on their tax returns, Congress wrote the deduction for auto loan interest so that it can apply to all taxpayers, including those claiming the standard deduction. On a tax form, the auto loan deduction will come before the calculation of a taxpayer’s adjusted gross income. That’s an important distinction, because many states use a taxpayer’s federal adjusted gross income as the starting point for figuring their state income taxes. If that income figure is lower, it could reduce the state taxes owed. The verdict is out on whether the tax break will boost sales At Bowen Scarff Ford in Kent, Washington, customers started asking about the auto loan tax deduction before Congress had even taken a final vote on the tax-cut bill, said General Manager Paul Ray. So he decided to promote it on the dealer’s website. A website ribbon exclaims: CAR LOAN TAX DEDUCTION NOW AVAILABLE” while also promoting an electric vehicle tax credit that is ending soon as a result of Trump’s tax-cut law. I think its going to help incentivize vehicle purchases through this year,” Ray said. Celia Winslow, president and CEO of the American Financial Services Association, concurred: For some people deciding should I buy it, should I not this could be something that tips the scale. Others remain skeptical. According to Smoke’s math, the average annual tax savings is smaller than a single month’s loan payment for a new vehicle. I dont think it moves the needle on somebody on the fence of buying a new vehicle or not,” Smoke said. “But I think it could influence their decision to finance that vehicle instead of paying cash or instead of leasing a vehicle. David A. Lieb, Associated Press
Category:
E-Commerce
Starbucks has been in a bit of a slump, facing stagnant growth as it awaits its new CEO Brian Niccols turnaround. His strategy? Nicer stores you want to sit in. Protein-loaded coffee. And now . . . turning every day at Starbucks into a viral drop. The company is launching a secret menu in its app today, building off the momentum of its not-so-secret menu broadcast channel on Instagram. Secret menus, of course, are irresistible to the fleshy consumer brain. A mystery and treat in one! But in the case of Starbucks, its part of a brilliant promotional strategy by its new chief brand officer Tressie Lieberman. How will Starbuckss Secret Menu work? The menu will contain rotating offers for drinks. But instead of being born inside its Seattle headquarters coffee lab, these drinks are created by fans on social media who use Starbuckss customization options to create particularly alluring beverages. Thats what people do today: create their own Starbucks order, says Lieberman. And so how do we tap into that? Indeed, customization is a big part of Starbuckss appeal; you can order a drink just as you like it. But its menu has become so sprawling and complicated for baristas to produce that Niccol has actually cut it back by nearly a third to simplify production. Whats brilliant about the Starbucks Secret Menuwhich is launching with a $25,000 prize to stoke interestis twofold: Instead of creating a TikTok trend, it can simply ride a TikTok trend, since people are already promoting their own custom drinks on the service. But the second component is just as important for a company with tens of thousands of locations worldwide. These glitzy, viral drinks are being made with the ingredients Starbucks already has lying around. In other words, its all turnkey. Starbucks doesnt need to spin up a whole production supply chain to sell the equivalent of a McRib. It can just rearrange its food stuffs to make something novel, a lot like Taco Bell combines its shells and sauces to make something newbut crowdsourced. This strategy is a far cry from how Starbucks used to look at viral creations: as operational headaches that were at odds with its own business model. Instead, Starbucks can analyze a viral menu item, decide if it needs to be tweaked for scale, and then share it back with its audience in a way that can work. Some of the best ideas are coming from customers. Customers decide what’s in; customers decide what’s cool, says Lieberman. [With the Secret Menu] We’re really just working to help put media behind [fans] and get more reach around new ideas. It’s a lot about being visible, visible to our audience, and being really strategic about how we approach these different trends as well, says Lieberman. She points to a recent viral drink called the Gummy Shark, where TikTokers took the Summer Berry Refresher and added cold foam so it would taste like the popular candy, as a recent proof point of this strategy. That’s a gift from our customers, says Lieberman. Let’s jump on that. Let’s create content around it and celebrate it, instead of moving away from it. In other words, with its new Secret Menu, Starbucks is building a workflow so that they dont need to come up with their next hit, while ensuring that you can taste the wild thing youre gawking at online easily. (Its new point-of-sale terminals will even be getting a viral drinks tab so that if you walk into a store without your phone, you can order off this menu as well.) The only question remaining is, can a secret menu stay cool when it’s available to millions of customers? Anyone who’s ordered a speak-easy-inspired Neapolitan shake or animal style fries from In-N-Out knows . . . the answer is a sad and true, “absolutely yes.”
Category:
E-Commerce
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