​FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CF Technologies, Inc. and Battelle Energy Alliance are granted U.S. Patent No. 12,416,064 B2 for Separation and Purification of Metals, with a focus on Rare Earth Elements.
Boston, MA — March 10, 2026 — CF Technologies, Inc., an innovator in the field of separation technologies, announced that the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has granted U.S. Patent No. 12,416,064 B2, entitled Systems and Methods for Selective Recovery of Metals from Ion Exchange Resins, covering a novel approach to purify valuable metals, including lanthanide radio isotopes such as lutetium 177 used in medicine, nuclear forensics, and research.
This patent strengthens CF Techs’ intellectual property portfolio around its core separation technologies and provides protection for key innovations as development moves to commercialization.

Key Details & Significance

• Patent number & issuance: U.S. Patent No. 12,416,064 B2, issued on September 16, 2025.
• Title: Systems and Methods for Selective Recovery of Metals from Ion Exchange Resins
• Inventors / Assignees: The inventors are Dr. Laura Sinclair, John Moses, Jessica Sweeney and Justin Gonzalez of CF Technologies, and Drs. Robert Fox and Mary Case of Battelle Energy Alliance, LLC (Idaho National Lab). The patent is assigned to CF Tech and Battelle Energy Alliance.
• Technology summary: The invention covers systems and methods for purification of rare earth elements, including radioisotopes used in the treatment of cancer. The non-aqueous process has numerous advantages over conventional purification technologies. It provides greater purification in higher yield in a single step, it is faster, lower cost, more efficient, and generates less hazardous waste than conventional methods.
• Problem addressed: The process addresses a long-standing challenge by offering a simple, cost-effective method to quickly produce in very high purity, short-lived radioisotopes.
• Applications & market potential: Along with other innovations at CF Tech, this technology can be deployed in small volume uses such radiopharmaceuticals manufacturing, stable isotope production, and nuclear forensics, and large volume rare earth element recovery, separation, and purification from recycling, mining, magnets and ore refining. Rare earth elements are needed for numerous applications in defense and electronics, and in magnets for electric vehicles, wind turbines, and many other applications. While radiopharmaceutical use continues to increase due to its success in cancer therapy, a key to both economic and patient outcomes is the speed of processing these short-lived isotopes. As global demand intensifies for radiopharmaceutical therapies and imaging, [Lu-177, Tb-161, Ac-225, Tl-201, Ga-67, Yt-90, At-211, Cu-64, Cu-67, among others], this patent positions the company to lead in commercialization and licensing for production of these critical radioisotopes.

 
Co-inventor and company president, John Moses, thanks employees, and the group at Idaho National Lab, and the MIT Nuclear Research Lab for their contributions to the development of this groundbreaking technology, which when implemented enables greater purification in a simplified process, resulting in reduced worker and environmental hazards and improvement in the treatment of cancer patients at lower cost.

Strategic Outlook & Next Steps
With this patent, CF Technologies, Inc. is positioned to:

• Engage in strategic partnerships and technology licensing,
• Advance development and validation in additional applications,
• Explore commercialization in markets prioritized for 2026 and beyond,
• Use the patent as a differentiator in funding rounds, marketing, and customer engagement.

“As we look to partners for commercial rollout," said Jessica Sweeney, Vice-President of CF Technologies, Inc., “the issuance of U.S. Patent No. 12,416,064 B2 marks a milestone in securing IP protection for our core innovation. This patent validates our direction and bolsters confidence among investors, collaborators, and customers in our path forward.”

About CF Technologies, Inc.
CF Technologies, Inc. is a world-renowned research, engineering, and manufacturing firm specializing in supercritical fluid processes and separations technology. Founded in 1989, the company focuses on advancements in clean and green technology upgrades including those in medical and renewable fuel industries.
For more information, visit cftechnologies.com for specific details on CF Tech’s Lu-177 radioactive separations as described in our white paper, 8914-WP3.
About Battelle Energy Alliance / Idaho National Laboratory
Battelle Energy Alliance manages INL for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy. INL is the nation’s center for nuclear energy research and development, and also performs research in each of DOE’s strategic goal areas: energy, national security, science and the environment. For more information, visit www.inl.gov and follow on social media: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and X.

Media Contact
Jessica Sweeney, Vice President, CF Technologies, Inc.                                                                     
(617) 364-2500
[email protected]
cftechnologies.com

In just a single, well thought out experiment, CF Tech confirmed their hypothesis, selective extraction of rare earth elements is not only feasible, but successful! Please comment if you have a rare earth element containing feedstock or waste stream! What's interesting about it, what is the composition? Is it a waste stream that could provide additional revenue streams? If so, it's worth having CF Tech check it out for extraction and separation. Please contact us for more information, [email protected]
As all good scientists know, if you want to believe the results, you must run in at least triplicate. We did, the results are still promising, we will continue to run simulated feedstocks before switching over to real world matrices. 
Josh Harrington of Eldex Corporation, a key supplier for high pressure pumps came to visit our bench top setup and provide valuable system pumping guidance, he discusses his visit around Massachusetts, including to AIChE Boston 2025. 

On May 19, 2022 the Department of Energy announced the winners of the Phase I Release 2 SBIR/STTR winners, CF Tech has been awarded a grant to conduct research and development of an innovative supercritical carbon dioxide (scCO2) process to extract and purify rare earth elements from Florida's phosphate mining waste streams!
CF Tech has been using scCO2 for decades to replace hazardous and expensive chemicals in process operations. This extraction process aims to open a new pathway for access to valuable critical materials - which are in desperate need.
The CF Tech team will be partnering with industry leader and expert, Dr. Patrick Zhang and the Florida Polytechnic University's FIPR. Finding value in waste streams is something that CF Tech is very good at, whether it's biodiesel or astaxanthin, we're finding ways to find, separate, purify and produce the good parts!  
The Department of Energy release quoted U.S. Secretary of Energy, Jennifer Granholm "Tackling the climate crisis and securing America’s economic competitiveness will require the full scope of American enterprise, especially the small businesses that are propelling clean energy advances. These projects will not only unlock a range of equitable climate solutions, but also create good-paying jobs, lower costs, and forge a better future for underprivileged American families and communities."
CF Tech is so proud to be included amongst the awardees! In parallel with this grant, CF Tech will look at a variety of streams from mining to recycling to pursue domestic, economical methods of rare earth element collection and production.

Yesterday, the Department of Energy released their list of SBIR/STTR Phase II award winners, CF Tech was selected to continue their development of ASTM biodiesel! CF Tech is honored to be on this short list of winner and wishes the best to all of the other award winners.

The list of EERE winners can be found on the Energy.gov website here:
https://energy.gov/eere/technology-to-market/downloads/fy-2017-sbirsttr-phase-ii-release-2-award-selections

In this program, CF Tech will work with a Federal Laboratory and WRR to turn waste water treatment plant and consolidation plant "brown grease", trust me, it's some nasty stuff, into ASTM certified B100. Additional research is on-going and we plan to be providing commercial scale systems to waste water treatment plants and consolidation facilities all across the country within a few years, stay tuned for more info!

Two of our current CO2 extraction projects are for the neutracuetical and fragrance industries.  Trust me, the fragrance experiments smell much better!  Although both used our go-to bench scale R&D system, the experimental programs were night and day.  One of the experiments, we ran at high temperatures, 180C and high pressure, 15000psi; the second experimental program started off with high temps and high pressure, but as the testing matrix was expanded, we found, through sensory and visual testing that the preferred operating conditions was a liquid CO2, about 1200psi with the feedstock extraction vessel maintaining temperatures below 105F!  CO2 extraction of natural feedstocks has so much variety and potential to extract differing compounds, oils, and value items...only tests will tell!