American Battery Metals will advance construction of its battery metals recycling plant in Nevada with a $10 million investment commitment from Unifinance Limited, the company said Wednesday.
American Battery Metals said the funding commitment will position the company to aggressively pursue its lithium-ion battery recycling initiatives and advanced extraction technology. The company is also conducting drilling programs at potential lithium mining projects in Nevada as it seeks to become the world’s first fully integrated battery metals supply chain provider.
The Nevada-based battery metals company announced plans for the recycling facility in 2019 in response to concerns over the stability of the battery metals supply chain in meeting future demand for renewable batteries.
“The American Battery Metals Corporation recycling process will address a global e-waste challenge, while reintroducing critically-needed materials back into the supply chain for the electric vehicle and energy storage sectors,” VCM Group Director Michael Vogel said in a statement. Unifinance is an affiliate of VCM.
Unifinance’s investment will also allow the company to eliminate a portion of its convertible debt and fund other working capital needs.
The recycling facility will extract lithium, cobalt, nickel and other metals from feedstock in the form of scrap, consumer electronics and end-of-life electric vehicle batteries.
“Mining and development projects take time to bring resources online, and battery manufacturers need the crucial metals now,” ABMC said in a separate statement last week.
“The economic and national security implications are so acute, the US government is actively seeking innovative solutions from the market to help break America’s reliance on foreign sources of critical minerals.”
In October, ABMC appointed Ryan Melsert as chief technology officer and head of its battery metal extraction and recycling divisions. Melsert is the former manager of Tesla’s battery materials processing division.
ABMC said its battery recycling plant is scheduled to be fully operational in late 2020.
