Using proprietary applied sciences, Gradiant’s objective is to scale back water use, decrease wastewater discharge, reclaim assets and convert wastewater into freshwater. To higher serve the lithium sector, the corporate lately spun out alkaLi, a brand new firm targeted on scaling battery-grade lithium manufacturing utilizing its proprietary EC2 know-how.
As famous on the corporate’s web site, EC2 is designed to extract, focus and convert lithium shortly and effectively, lowering operational prices and environmental influence. The know-how, which adapts to numerous lithium sources and integrates with current infrastructure, has been efficiently examined and confirmed commercially.
“It is a startup that advantages from over a decade of expertise, and from all of the funding we have now raised,” stated Bajpayee.
For Govindan, Gradiant’s success within the water therapy area is a pure match for the lithium extraction sector.
“The DLE area is glorified water therapy,” he defined whereas talking with INN. “Adsorption, resins, ion alternate and membranes are our bread-and-butter water therapy processes. “
Gradiant’s major water focus and proprietary applied sciences give alkaLi an edge, famous Bajpayee.
“I believe one distinction is we’re a water firm making an attempt to do DLE, not a DLE firm making an attempt to do water. As a result of you possibly can’t simply do DLE — you both must do water, or you must companion with water firms,” the CEO defined.
alkaLi’s EC2 is a versatile, three stage system designed to course of lithium from varied sources, together with brine, evaporation and recycling. It may be utilized in full or in standalone levels, integrates with current infrastructure and provides an choice to spice up manufacturing with Gradiant’s SmartOps AI platform.
Extracting worth from wastewater
Whereas alkaLi is lithium centric, Gradiant has a protracted historical past of aiding the mining sector within the extraction of commodities from water. “We have now labored throughout mining purposes, not simply crucial minerals like nickel, cobalt and lithium, but additionally iron ore mines, uranium mines and different sectors,” stated Govindan.
In his view, the mining sector has two very particular points. First, in lithium processing, the mineral is present in water, requiring experience in focus, decontamination and conversion to supply battery-grade supplies. This course of can also be relevant to nickel, cobalt and different crucial minerals.
The second challenge is wastewater therapy or tailings reprocessing, reminiscent of in Chile’s copper mines, the place tailing ponds comprise crucial minerals and extremely polluting wastewater. The know-how Gradiant has developed can reclaim beneficial minerals whereas recycling wastewater into recent water for industrial use.
Pointing to Chile’s Atacama province, the place water shortage is a distinguished challenge, Govindan famous that as a lot as 60 p.c of the potable water within the area is used for mining purposes.
“Once we get better and reuse that wastewater to the extent of 90 p.c, we are able to scale back that 60 p.c all the best way down to six p.c,” he stated. “So it is an enormous environmental influence, water sustainability influence.”
Based on a 2023 article printed within the journal “Science of the Complete Setting,” tailings reprocessing can scale back the quantity of tailings that should be saved, decrease the greenhouse fuel emissions related to new mining and provide roughly 2 p.c of the EU’s future copper demand.
Govindan highlighted a nickel challenge in Australia, the place the corporate was introduced in to get better 20 p.c of the nickel that wasn’t recovered throughout processing, resulting in losses in wastewater.
Gradiant proposed an answer to get better a lot of the misplaced nickel, considerably boosting the challenge’s profitability.
Focusing on tailings can even produce industrial water for reuse, because the Gradiant executives identified. Moreover, as Bajpayee famous, the processes utilized by Gradiant and alkaLi not solely produce reusable water, however can even get better salt and different minerals, leading to “true zero-discharge initiatives.”
Junior-focused enterprise mannequin
Having the ability to get better misplaced minerals whereas reusing water can result in vital value financial savings.
“As an alternative of promoting the gear and strolling away, we are going to put it on the web site and function the gear. The proprietor pays us per liter of water we produce, per tonne of lithium we produce, which actually helps the juniors,” stated Govindan.
“(Juniors) are in a capital-intensive trade, and when costs are US$12,000 per tonne for lithium, they don’t seem to be capable of elevate capital. Then there may be Gradiant, the one unicorn within the water tech area. We have now a superb stability sheet; additionally we’re capable of elevate debt and fairness capital, which we are able to use to assist them by placing the gear ourselves.”
EC2’s modular design makes it simple and quick to arrange, which is one other plus for junior miners seeking to benefit from future market developments shortly. “Two issues are crucial by way of product philosophy for us (and) for lithium particularly: productization and digitalization. The EC2 know-how could be very modular and it’s totally digital,” stated Govindan.
“We have now synthetic intelligence; we have now a SmartOps platform we developed for water therapy, however is lithium relevant. So we’re capable of present extremely modular, extremely digitalized options.”
For firms seeking to produce lithium hydroxide as an alternative of carbonate, a easy converter might be applied that converts carbonate to hydroxide, the executives defined.
Being a bespoke water-first firm additionally makes the applied sciences developed by Gradiant versatile.
“Utilizing variable brines is one thing that truly comes fairly naturally to us,” stated Bajpayee. “And the flexibility to customise options makes it additionally extensively relevant, whether or not it is South America, the US or Australia.”
Apart from designing water options for industries like mining, Gradiant has developed applied sciences to focus on perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), also referred to as without end chemical substances.
Gradiant’s ForeverGone is a complete resolution for completely eliminating PFAS. In contrast to present applied sciences that solely switch PFAS waste, ForeverGone makes use of micro-foam fractionation to pay attention PFAS, in addition to a destruction engine for electro-oxidation to utterly destroy the chemical substances.
This course of ensures water meets or exceeds US Environmental Safety Company requirements, providing an environment friendly, cost-effective and sustainable technique for PFAS removing.
“(The objective is) to construct an influence that may outlast you. That is the final word measure of success,” stated Bajpayee.
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Securities Disclosure: I, Georgia Williams, maintain no direct funding curiosity in any firm talked about on this article.
Editorial Disclosure: The Investing Information Community doesn’t assure the accuracy or thoroughness of the data reported within the interviews it conducts. The opinions expressed in these interviews don’t mirror the opinions of the Investing Information Community and don’t represent funding recommendation. All readers are inspired to carry out their very own due diligence.