BROWN ANNOUNCES NEW PARTNERSHIP TO RECYCLE NICKEL IN PIKETON

Following Brown’s Push, the Department of Energy Begins a New Partnership to Recycle High Purity Nickel for Use in Electrification

PIKETON, OH – Today, U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) announced that the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is entering into a partnership with Leidos and The Conductive Group to develop a new facility that will recycle surface contaminated nickel in Piketon and create jobs in the community.

The Department of Energy and Leidos and The Conductive Group will partner on a multi-phased project to develop a commercial scale processing facility at the former Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant (PORTS) in Piketon to recycle surface contaminated nickel.

“Together with the Piketon community and Ohio Steelworkers, we worked to make this partnership a reality because we knew it would create good union jobs, grow the local economy, and advance the environmental cleanup at PORTS,” said Brown. “By working together, we are building a stronger future for Piketon.”

Nickel is a critical for the modern battery technologies that are foundational to our country’s economic future and vital for numerous products. There is approximately 6,400 tons of nickel located at PORTS. Nickel recovered from PORTS could be used to produce a high-purity nickel for products like grid scale batteries.

“For two decades, the United Steelworkers have been trying to unlock the potential of recycling the nickel from the DOE Portsmouth site to support reindustrialization. Senator Sherrod Brown has stood apart from the rest as a partner in Washington and has worked tirelessly to ensure valuable metals in rural Ohio can be used to create good-paying union jobs. This week, his advocacy and ours paid off,” said Herman Potter, President, Local USW Local 689.

“We are very excited to hear about the Department's announcement that they have selected a company to extract some of the nickel at the PORTS site. I know this has been years in the making and has been of high concern to the Commission. This announcement is a big step toward bringing in a talented outside workforce and providing good jobs for the talented people here in Pike County. We hope this initial step will be successful and lead to further nickel extraction and potentially more manufacturing onsite, ultimately bringing more jobs to Pike County and the surrounding community,” said Tony Montgomery, Pike County Commissioner.

This project does not require federal funding and will employ local United Steelworkers (USW) members. 

Senator Brown has been pushing the DOE on efforts around the cleanup and reindustrialization of PORTS throughout his time in office as a U.S. Senator, including pushing DOE to move forward with this opportunity to recycle nickel. 

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