Article says things like "And the company asserts it can extract the materials with virtually zero waste. It will also use no explosives or chemicals at the site, said CEO and founder Andre Zeitoun." which I'm curious about but no where does it explain the process in the article.

This deposit is just west of Utah Lake (south of Great Salt Lake).  Article says the deposit contains 16 metals including gallium, germanium, rubidium, cesium, scandium, lithium, vanadium, tungsten, niobium, among others.

According to a Google search of the company Ionic Mineral Technologies, what they’re talking about is ion-adsorption clay (IAC), which is different from hard-rock mining. In IAC deposits, metals like rare earths aren’t locked inside minerals, they’re loosely attached to clay particles at the atomic level. That means they can sometimes be released using simple ion-exchange (basically washing the clay with a mild salt solution) instead of blasting, crushing, or high-temperature acid processing. This *can* greatly reduce waste, energy use, and chemicals compared to traditional mining, which is why companies claim it’s “low impact.” That said, it’s not magic or zero-impact, but it still involves water handling, processing, and waste management to a certain extent.  The real test will be whether the process works at scale without the environmental problems seen in similar clay mining elsewhere (notably in China).

Often times in mining, the demonstration/explanation is considerably better than the real results, but USA must move forward on critical minerals if we want to make cool stuff that we currently depend on China for.

Why a new mineral find near Utah Lake is drawing national attention