Former U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia has joined the board of directors of Ramaco Resources, bringing an expertise that complements the company’s ambition to become “the first new rare earth mine in the country,” said Randall Atkins, Ramaco’s chairman and CEO.
Along with metallurgical coal mining operations in West Virginia, Virginia and Kentucky, Ramaco has the Brook Mine in Wyoming along with a carbon business incubator in Sheridan County. It also is pursuing a huge rare earth deposit in Wyoming the company has estimated could be valued at more than $37 billion.
“I have known Sen. Manchin for a number of years,” Atkins told Cowboy State Daily on Tuesday. “We have a lot of operations in West Virginia on the metallurgical coal side, and I have also testified before the Senate Energy Committee.”
Manchin, a former Democrat who later registered as an independent, was chair of the Senate Energy Committee while Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso was the ranking minority member.
Barrasso responded enthusiastically Tuesday to the news of Manchin’s board appointment.
“Throughout his time in the Senate, Sen. Manchin worked side by side with me to promote and unleash American energy,” Barrasso told Cowboy State Daily.
