The 200,000-square-foot facility will be located in the Alliance area of north Fort Worth. Costing about $100 million — $40 million to construct and $60 million in installed equipment — the facility plans to begin manufacturing toward the end of 2023.
According to the company’s press release, the facility “will have the capacity to produce approximately 1,000 tonnes of neodymium-iron-boron (NdFeB) magnets per year, supporting the production of approximately 500,000 [electric vehicle] traction motors.”
The company has an agreement to produce these necessary components for General Motors electric vehicles.
MP Materials, which has its headquarters in Las Vegas, sources its rare earth minerals from Mountain Pass, California. Its mission is “to restore the full rare earth supply chain to the United States of America.”
It not only has the contract with General Motors but was recently awarded a $35 million contract with the U.S. Department of Defense to process heavy rare earth elements.
“While the elements themselves aren’t rare, ore bodies containing sufficient concentrations to make processing economically viable are exceedingly rare,” said MP Materials.
Federal, state, and local officials celebrated the groundbreaking and supported the goals of MP Materials.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) said, “The United States needs to do everything we can to end our dangerous dependence on China for rare earth elements and critical minerals across the entire supply chain. It is both significant and important that MP Materials is going beyond mining and into alloying and manufacturing, and I’m deeply proud of the role Texas is playing in these projects.”
“MP’s investment will bring hundreds of new jobs and millions in economic growth to the TX-12 community,” Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX-12) said.
Fort Worth Mayor Mattie Parker also praised the project.
“This new MP Materials facility is an excellent fit for the groundbreaking work being done at AllianceTexas, and it presents an incredible opportunity to bring more advanced manufacturing jobs home to the U.S. right here in Fort Worth,” said Parker.
A seven-year tax abatement agreement reached with the company under Chapter 312 of the Texas Tax Code will provide an abatement for up to 60 percent of the real property and business personal property taxes owed. It was approved by the city in January.
City economic development department reports anticipate the abatement to be 20 percent in the first year and to reach its full 60 percent abatement in year three.
The amount of taxes abated, according to the agreement, is not to exceed the lesser of $2,762,300 or 150 percent of minimum capital investment expenditures by the company.
The conditions of the agreement require the creation of 30 full-time jobs by the end of 2023 and about 100 jobs at full operation. The minimum salary for those full-time jobs is $80,390.
According to Tarrant Appraisal District reports, this MP Materials tax abatement agreement is one of many in place in Fort Worth. They affect 95 properties accounting for $730,582,104 in market value within Fort Worth. The exemptions granted by the abatement agreements totaled $210,029,832.
The city had $84,597,145,714 in total taxable property on its tax rolls as of July 2021.
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Kim Roberts
Kim Roberts is a regional reporter for the Texan in the DFW metroplex area where she has lived for over twenty years. She has a Juris Doctor from Baylor University Law School and a Bachelor's in government from Angelo State University. In her free time, Kim home schools her daughter and coaches high school extemporaneous speaking and apologetics. She has been happily married to her husband for 23 years, has three wonderful children, and two dogs.