Sustainable battery technology startup CarbonScapeannouncedan $18 million investment in biographite for batteries. The New Zealand startup claims that its biographite acts as a carbon-negative substitute for the essential petroleum-based and naturally mined material in lithium-ion batteries.
CarbonScape produces its biographite using byproducts from the forestry and timber industry, such as wood chips. With a carbon-negative footprint, CarbonScape expects its material to save up to 30 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions per metric ton compared to mined or petroleum-based graphite.
The startup projects that battery producers could use the biographite to reduce the carbon footprint of each battery by approximately 30%, potentially resulting in an annual saving of over 86 million metric tons of carbon dioxide by 2030.
According to the publication Elements, graphite accounts for nearly half of the weight of a lithium-ion battery. However, Project Blue predicts a global supply deficit of 777,000 metric tons of graphite by 2030.
CarbonScape stated that its method could make enough biographite to fulfill half of the projected global graphite demand for grid-scale and EV batteries by 2030. This would reportedly be accomplished by using less than 5% of the forestry industry byproducts produced annually in North America and Europe.
CarbonScape also stressed that biographite production could be localized to electric vehicle and battery manufacturers to vertically integrate regional and domestic supply chains.
Image Credit: CarbonScape
