Aqua Metals (AQMS) Rockets on Battery-Recycling Breakthroughs and Strategic Deals
Aqua Metals is a pre-revenue “moonshot”-type company that has been known for recycling lead-acid batteries with its AquaRefining™ technology, and is now pivoting to lithium-ion batteries.ts2.tech Its patented process shreds spent Li-ion batteries into “black mass” and uses only water and electricity to extract lithium, cobalt, nickel, manganese and copper. The result, the company says, is very pure battery materials with far lower emissions than traditional smeltingts2.techts2.tech. For example, Aqua Metals recently reported it produced lithium carbonate with under 30 ppm fluorine – meeting stringent battery-grade specifications – and over a metric ton of NMC hydroxide for industry partnersir.aquametals.comnasdaq.com. These breakthroughs reinforce Aqua Metals’ claim of a “commercially proven sustainable, closed-loop” recycling processts2.techts2.tech. In practical terms, Aqua Metals has built a small-scale pilot campus and sold one demonstration facility this year. The proceeds of the $4.3 M sale went to eliminate all long-term debtir.aquametals.comir.aquametals.com. Management says it will use modular AquaRefining “ARC” units to eventually scale up a large plant. The company may operate plants itself or license the technology. CEO Steve Cotton stresses that Aqua Metals is capital-constrained but building credibility: as he told investors, its new patent filings position it as a key licensor in the emerging recycling
