IREL (India)

India's state-owned rare earth producer under the Department of Atomic Energy, mining monazite-bearing beach sands in Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Odisha, making mixed rare earth chloride at OSCOM and separated oxides including NdPr and samarium at Aluva, with a small samarium-cobalt magnet plant at Visakhapatnam.

Points to check

Facts from the sources on this page that a reader should weigh before relying on the company's own figures.

FY2024-25 mixed rare earth chloride output fell about 11% due to lower RE-bearing mineral content, and high-purity oxide operations at Aluva were curtailed to control inventory for lack of a domestic midstream industry (AR 2024-25).
IREL's NdPr oxide is reported to support only 1,200-1,500 t/yr of magnet production in the short term against the scheme's 6,000 t/yr target (SMM, Aug 2026).
Four new mining projects were awaiting statutory clearances as of June 2025, and the Brahmagiri project was still at the MDO-engagement stage for clearances (IREL projects page).
No company-level resource or reserve statement is published; national monazite grades cited to Parliament are 0.056-0.058% (April 2026).
The Visakhapatnam SmCo plant is about 3 t/yr, and its products were still in end-user testing per AR 2024-25.

At a glance

Founded: 1950 — Incorporated 18 August 1950 as Indian Rare Earths Limited; first unit was the Rare Earths Division at Aluva, Kerala (operational 1952). Became a full Government of India undertaking under the Department of Atomic Energy in 1963; Schedule-B Mini Ratna Category-1 CPSE.
Headquarters: Mumbai (Prabhadevi), Maharashtra, India
Ownership: Unlisted central public sector enterprise (government company); Government of India holds 100% of shares; administrative ministry is the Department of Atomic Energy. Paid-up capital Rs 345.46 crore.
Stage: Mature. State-owned producer that has mined beach-sand monazite and separated rare earths for decades; also runs a small samarium-cobalt magnet plant in Visakhapatnam.
Listing: Government-owned. Indian government undertaking.
Revenue: Total income Rs 2,036 crore; profit before tax Rs 1,102 crore
Reported, FY2024-25 (year to 31 March 2025).
Source

Capacity

Each date below links to the document the figure came from. A capacity figure with no source is not on this page.

What	Figure	Status	As of
Mixed rare earth chloride (rare earth concentrate), OSCOM REEP	11,200 t/yr installed (nameplate)	Operating	Oct 2026
Monazite feed to OSCOM monazite plant	10,000 t/yr monazite input (nameplate, commercial operation from 1 May 2015)	Operating	Oct 2026
Rare Earths Division, Aluva (separated high-purity oxides)	'about 4,000 metric ton' after expansion; basis (annual, feed or product) not stated	Operating	Oct 2026
NdPr oxide production capacity (company-wide)	400-500 t/yr (reported; secondary source); about 500 t NdPr oxide in inventory	Operating	Aug 2026
Neodymium output target	450 t in FY2025-26 rising to 900 t by 2030 (Reuters, via Outlook Business); a separate November 2025 report gives about 200 t FY2025-26 rising to 500 t FY2026-27	Announced	Nov 2025
Rare earths mined (basis not stated)	2,900 t in 2024 (Reuters); more than 1,000 t of rare earth materials shipped to Japan by Toyotsu in 2024	Historical	Jun 2025
Samarium-cobalt magnets, Visakhapatnam REPM plant	3 t/yr SmCo magnets (Parliament reply, April 2026; operator not named in that report)	Commissioned	Apr 2026
Heavy mineral processing, all units (ilmenite, rutile, zircon, sillimanite, garnet, monazite)	'about 10 lakh' (1,000,000) t/yr processing capacity per IREL; actual mineral production over 6 lakh (600,000) t in FY2025-26	Operating	Oct 2026
Rare earth metals (La, Ce, Nd), Bhopal theme park	no capacity published; AR 2024-25 says metals are produced 'at industrial scale'	Pilot scale	Nov 2025

Narrative

IREL (India) Limited was incorporated on August 18, 1950 as Indian Rare Earths Limited and became a full Government of India undertaking under the Department of Atomic Energy in 1963; the government holds 100% of its shares and it is unlisted. Its first unit, the Rare Earths Division at Aluva, Kerala, began processing monazite in 1952 and was refurbished in 2012 to refine mixed rare earth chloride into oxides of lanthanum, cerium, neodymium-praseodymium (NdPr), samarium, europium, gadolinium and yttrium at more than 99% purity. IREL mines and separates beach-sand minerals at Chavara (Kerala), Manavalakurichi (Tamil Nadu) and the Orissa Sands Complex (OSCOM) in Odisha, commissioned in 1986. The OSCOM Rare Earth Extraction Plant, commissioned in 2015-16, has an installed (nameplate) capacity of 11,200 t/yr of mixed rare earth chloride. According to the FY2024-25 annual report (year to March 31, 2025), chloride output fell about 11% because of lower rare-earth-bearing mineral content, and high-purity oxide output at Aluva was curtailed to control inventory. SMM reported in August 2026 that IREL's NdPr oxide capacity is 400 to 500 t/yr. A samarium-cobalt magnet plant at Visakhapatnam, built for IREL inside a BARC facility using BARC reduction-diffusion technology, was inaugurated on May 11, 2023; a reply to Parliament in April 2026 put its capacity at 3 t/yr, and the FY2024-25 annual report said production had started, with samples in end-user testing. A Rare Earth and Titanium Theme Park in Bhopal, with demonstration plants for lanthanum, cerium and neodymium metal and for recovering NdPr from end-of-life magnets, was inaugurated in May 2026. Under a 2012 agreement IREL supplied rare earth chloride to Toyotsu Rare Earths India for processing and export to Japan; Reuters reported in June 2025 that IREL had been asked to suspend it. The Rs 7,280 crore scheme approved on November 26, 2025 for 6,000 t/yr of sintered NdFeB magnet capacity offers a limited assured supply of NdPr oxide from IREL to the three lowest bidders; 20 bids were received by August 12, 2026, and no awards or supply contracts had been announced. FY2024-25 total income was Rs 2,036 crore and profit before tax Rs 1,102 crore; for FY2025-26 IREL reported total income above Rs 2,000 crore and mineral production of more than 600,000 t.

Where public sources disagree

FY2023-24 top line: IREL's About page gives sales turnover 'exceeding Rs 20,248.97 million' (Rs 2,025 crore); Outlook Business (June 2025) gives revenue of Rs 2,264.47 crore, which matches the AR 2024-25 total-income chart. Likely different measures (sales vs total income).
Neodymium output: Reuters via Outlook Business (June 2025) cites 450 t in FY2025-26 rising to 900 t by 2030; IBEF (Nov 2025) cites about 200 t in FY2025-26 rising to 500 t in FY2026-27.
Visakhapatnam REPM plant cost: Wikipedia (citing IREL) Rs 197 crore; PSU Watch (May 2023) Rs 165 crore.
Visakhapatnam products: PSU Watch (May 2023) says SmCo and NdFeB magnets; IREL AR 2024-25 and the April 2026 Parliament reply describe SmCo magnets only.
Mineral processing capacity: IREL About page 'about 10 lakh' t/yr; Business Standard (Dec 2025) 6 lakh (600,000) t/yr.
Bhopal theme park inauguration: IANS via Investment Guru India (8 May 2026) says 'Saturday' (9 May 2026); Chem Industry Digest (Aug 2026) says 10 May.

Sources

IREL Annual Report 2024-25 — IREL (India) Limited (2025-11-11)
OSCOM Rare Earth Extraction Plant — IREL (India) Limited (2026-10-16)
About us — IREL (India) Limited (2026-10-16)
Rare Earths Division Aluva — IREL (India) Limited (2026-10-16)
Projects under implementation — IREL (India) Limited (2026-10-16)
Rare Earth Theme Park Bhopal — IREL (India) Limited (2026-10-16)
REPM page — IREL (India) Limited (2026-10-16)
Annual reports index — IREL (India) Limited (2026-10-16)
PESB advertisement, Director (HR) — IREL / PESB (2026-07-27)
Cabinet approves Rs 7,280 crore REPM scheme — PMO India (2025-11-26)
MHI invites global bids for REPM units — All India Radio News (2026-03-20)
MHI invites bids (assured NdPr oxide from IREL) — Energetica India (2026-03-20)
REPM scheme gets 20 bids — ANI (2026-08-13)
India to conserve rare earths, halt Japan exports (Reuters) — Yahoo Finance / Reuters (2025-06-16)
India halts rare earth exports to Japan — Mining Technology (2025-06-16)
India reportedly halts rare earth exports to Japan — TrendForce (2025-06-17)
Why India's lone rare earth miner IREL isn't helping domestic automakers — Outlook Business (2025-06-17)
IREL dividend after record FY2025-26 production — PSU Connect (2026-10-09)
India to produce 500 t neodymium in FY27 — IBEF (2025-11-10)
Multi-fold rise in neodymium production by FY27 — Business Standard (2025-11-09)
SMM analysis: India rare earths — SMM (metal.com) (2026-08-21)
India has over 8.5 Mt rare earth reserves (Parliament) — IANS (2026-04-02)
India has 8.52 Mt REE reserves (Lok Sabha) — IANS (2025-07-23)
Parliament question: National Rare Earths Policy (PIB) — GlobalSecurity.org / PIB (2025-04-03)
PM inaugurates REPM plant Visakhapatnam — PSU Watch (2023-05-12)
Parliamentary panel suggests funding boost for IREL — Business Standard (2025-12-21)
Rare Earth and Titanium Theme Park to open in Bhopal (IANS) — Investment Guru India (2026-05-08)
IREL unlocks seven technologies — Chem Industry Digest (2026-08-19)
Toyota's rare earth gambit in India — Rare Earth Exchanges (2025-08-29)
India's rare earth awakening — Rare Earth Exchanges (2026-07-19)
India's strategic shift on rare earths — Open Magazine (2026-01-30)
IREL (India) — Wikipedia (2026-10-16)
IREL company financials (FY2024-25) — The Company Check (2026-10-16)

How this page is sourced

Everything here comes from public sources — company filings, annual reports, exchange announcements, government releases and trade press. Every figure is linked to the document it came from and carries the date that document was published, because a capacity number without a date is not a fact, it is a rumor with a decimal point.

What is deliberately absent: material nonpublic information. I have spent more than two decades in this industry and a good deal of what I know about these companies I learned under NDA. Those obligations do not expire and they do not bend for a website. Nothing I have been told in confidence appears here in any form, and nothing on this page — or missing from it — should be read as a signal about what I know privately. I hold NDAs absolutely. It is the reason clients tell me things.

Judgment is the other thing left out on purpose. This page reports what has been published and who published it. Whether a target is credible, whether a ramp will hold, whether a capacity figure survives contact with the plant behind it — that is the work I do for clients, and it does not belong in a free reference page.

Where public sources disagree, I say so rather than picking a winner. Where a figure has not been published, the field says so rather than carrying an estimate. An empty field is information too.

Public filings tell you what a company has said. Whether it holds up is a different question, and the one I get hired to answer.

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