Metastable Materials is a Bengaluru-based urban mining startup working on providing environment-friendly solutions for reducing the batteries' overall life-cycle cost to ensure the everyday applications of Lithium-ion Batteries (LiBs) in electric vehicles (EVs) become more affordable for the masses.
Founded in October 2021 by Shubham Vishvakarma, the startup is pioneering a first-of-its-kind, chemical-free technology and system for 'mining' that, in a sustainable and eco-friendly manner, can extract a wide range of materials from lithium-ion batteries, including materials such as copper, aluminium, cobalt, nickel, lithium, etc., with more than 90 per cent recovery rate.
Sustainable Approach
As compared to existing materials extraction technologies practised worldwide today, the company claims that Metastable's advanced and cutting-edge tech stands out by offering optimal efficiency and the highest extraction capabilities.
According to the company, the term 'Metastable' is a constant reminder that the startup needs to consistently push themselves towards developing a sustainable approach for 'urban mining', and they will not rest until they have fulfilled this mission.
The operations are solely based on the novel 'waste-as-ores' approach for 'urban mining', wherein the startup is committed to 'value creation from waste' by extracting metals out of dead (end-of-life) batteries to fulfil the existing demand for these materials across various industries.
After extraction, the materials can be used to make anything from medicines to industrial products to jet engines and new batteries. This, in turn, would reduce India's dependence on other countries to import specialty metals and build its infrastructure to manufacture lithium-ion cells, which it currently lacks.
Market Expected To Grow
Notably, the value of end-of-life lithium-ion batteries is projected to be US$ 30 billion globally, with a sizeable chunk expected to be contributed by the Indian market. The LiB batteries' waste, combined with other e-wastes, provides a lucrative opportunity and a competitive advantage for anyone in terms of extracting metals through urban mining in an economical manner.
According to the company, the entire infrastructure required to extract value from it has to be built over the next decade, and this is where Metastable steps in and are poised to play a pivotal role in the near future.
Metastable's extraction/treatment processes are designed to minimize waste and provide improved efficiency. Furthermore, the battery treatment methodology used by Metastable Materials also reduces capital expenditure and operational expenditure compared to conventional battery recycling practices/methods.
Currently, the industrial engineering team at Metastable is working on designing, fabricating, and testing the equipment with vendors, while their process engineering team is focused on improving the process efficiency. Metastable's focus on the design and fabrication of equipment to carry out their processes has led them to the creation of IPs and the filing of 4 patents as of date, along with more patents to be filed soon.
While sharing the information with The Logical Indian, the company said, "Metastable Materials is currently making rapid strides towards setting up their first pilot plant, which shall be able to handle 4 to 6 per cent of India's end-of-life Li-ion batteries treatment value chain. After that, the startup aspires to expand and build a larger plant to tackle global needs."