CBC Radio
 

Electric cars are booming. But what are the environmental costs of all those batteries?

Companies like Calgary startup Summit Nanotech are making a business out of reducing the impact of lithium mining.

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While on holiday in Tibet, geophysicist and company founder Amanda Hall saw locals extracting lithium from salt flats, which gave her an idea: pull brine up from the ground, remove the lithium, then return the saltwater.

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"We create a lot less waste, we don't use any fresh water, we reduce land use area by 26 times [and] we reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 50 per cent," said Hall, who is launching a pilot in Chile, and hopes to eventually bring the technology home to Canada.

May 28, 2021

Avenue Calgary
 

Filtering For the Future

"The most widely used lithium production process is time-consuming, requiring many months for lithium to settle out of saltwater brine pumped from underground into huge evaporation ponds. But Calgary-based Summit Nanotech has developed a patent-pending process that uses nanomaterials to speed up lithium production. 

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Kelly Krahulic, Summit Nanotech's vice president of technology and innovation, says the company's "denaLi" process uses a proprietary combination of sorbents along with nanoporous membranes to separate lithium from the brine much faster. "

June 2021

Press Release
 

Summit Nanotech announces opening of $US 10M Series A raise, and signs an LOI with UK-Based CleanTech Lithium to join Summit's multi-client pilot program in Chile

CALGARY, AB, May 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ - Summit Nanotech Corporation is pleased to announce the opening of their $US 10M  private placement Series A Financing Round. The Financing is anticipated to close in July 2021. Funds raised will be used to advance Summit's  denaLiTM DLE (direct lithium extraction) technology from the current pilot scale stage to a larger demonstration scale stage.

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Summit Nanotech is also pleased to announce that it has signed a Letter of Intent with UK-based CleanTech Lithium, to participate in the Company's multi-client field pilot program in Chile. The pilot is expected to begin testing in the 4th quarter of 2021, and run for 6 months.

Mar 17, 2021

Press Release
 

Summit Nanotech is excited to announce the signing of a definitive agreement for their joint pilot project with Lithium Chile Inc.

Steve Cochrane, President and CEO of Lithium Chile commented, “We are extremely excited to have our definitive agreement in place with Summit Nanotech so we can jointly prove the merits of their new technology for the ecologically sustainable production of lithium. We have received tremendous support from the local indigenous communities for our combined efforts to reduce environmental impact by changing the way lithium is produced from brine deposits. We see Summit’s technology as the future of our industry.”

Mar 8, 2021

Global News Calgary
 

Calgary woman uses nanotechnology to create new lithium extraction technology

Nov 12, 2020

Increasing Access to Capital Leveraging a National Network

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Oct 29, 2020

The Adventurous Investor

What next for Lithium ; cognitive dissonance and where’s there’s a will there isn’t always a way…..

 "A Finnish company, Fortum, announced it has reached a recycling rate of 80 percent for EV batteries, using a hydrometallurgical recycling process. It will be the first company in Europe to offer industrial scale hydrometallurgical process for recovering cobalt, manganese, nickel and lithium….Canadian Li-Cycle can achieve a recycling rate of 80 to 100% of materials in LIB’s, the company claims. Summit Nanotech designed an innovative new extraction method to generate battery grade Lithium Carbonate or Lithium Hydroxide direct from brine sustainably”.

Sept 22, 2020

Innovation Economy Council Livestream

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Clean Slate: How Canada can spur growth by procuring from its own cleantech startups.

Oct 8, 2020

Electronic Products & Technology

Summit Nanotech greens-up lithium extraction process

Hall’s team has developed a technology that extracts lithium from raw brine, creating a high purity lithium chemical to sell to battery manufacturers. They are doing this using electronics such as sensors, control panels, and automation systems to make their machines more reliable and optimize performance. The arrangement of modules being deployed depend on the makeup of the brine at different sites. All this, using no fresh water.

August 28, 2020

Clean Tech Open

Congratulations to Summit Nanotech on being selected as one of the eight 2020 Regional Winners of the Cleantech Open! Summit will be moving forward to National Judging on October 20th. Cleantech Open is the world’s largest cleantech accelerator, providing entrepreneurs and corporate innovators the resources they need to launch and grow successful cleantech businesses. ‘WE FIND, FUND AND FOSTER THE MOST PROMISING CLEANTECH STARTUPS ON THE PLANET.’

Oct 1, 2020

Press Release

"Summit Nanotech Closes $1.5M CAD Seed Financing Round and Signs
Agreement with Nevada based 3 Proton Lithium (3PL) Operating Inc. to
Advance Technology for Green Lithium Extraction in North America"

Calgary AB, Canada – August 10, 2020 – Summit Nanotech Corp. (“Summit Nanotech”or the “Company”) is pleased to announce that it has signed a Letter of Intent (LOI) with 3PLOperating Inc., a Nevada Corporation, for the development of their assets in Railroad Valley, Nevada field trialing Summit’s denaLiTM DLE (direct lithium extraction) technology. Summit Nanotech has developed a patent pending rapid extraction process for the sustainable production of lithium from natural brine sources. Its state-of-the-art technology improves yield, uses no fresh water, decreases environmental impact and lowers GHG emissions. This collaboration will stabilize North American’s domestic lithium supply, which is growing more important given the global rise in demand for lithium ion batteries for renewable energy storage and electric vehicles.

Sustainable Development Technology Canada

Summit Nanotech Receives Funding and Support from Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC)

"OTTAWA, ON, July 14, 2020 – In partnership with accelerators across Canada, Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC) today announced funding for 17 Canadian start-ups that are pushing the boundaries of technology to develop sustainable solutions that will drive our economy forward. 

The entrepreneurs receiving funding show the breadth and variety of Canadian business developing cleantech solutions. These small businesses are developing technologies to power electric vehicles and to navigate autonomous cars. They are using drones to plant trees and data to improve fish farms. They enable heavy-duty vehicles to run on hydrogen, and they convert carbon dioxide into high-value fuels. They are replacing agrochemicals and inventing active compostable packaging. They are deploying nanotechnology, robotics, artificial intelligence, synthetic biology, and human ingenuity. "

June 16, 2020

InvestingNews.com

"Lithium Chile Signs Agreement with Summit Nanotech to Advance Green Lithium Extraction"

Lithium Chile Inc. (TSXV:LITH) (“Lithium Chile” or the “Company”) is pleased to announce it has signed a Letter of Intent (LOI) with Summit Nanotech Corporation for the advancement of their green lithium extraction technology in Chile. Summit Nanotech has developed a patent pending extraction process that allows for the rapid production of lithium from natural brine sources. Its technology is state of the art and shows great promise for the economical production of lithium while significantly reducing the overall environmental impact of lithium mining. The collaboration will set new standards for responsible lithium production, which is growing more important given the global rise in demand for lithium ion batteries for renewable energy and electric vehicles

June 16, 2020

Mining.com

"Breakthrough technique could produce lithium in hours"

"New extraction technologies promise to curb the use of water and energy in lithium production, and to potentially open up new sources of supply, including petroleum wastewater and geothermal brines, according to BNEF. Companies including Eramet SA, Rincon Ltd. and Summit Nanotech Corp. are among others who’re developing nano-filtration technologies."

March 9, 2020

CBC

"New tech aims to extract lithium for electric car batteries from oilfield waste"

"Lithium — a component of electric vehicle batteries — is a growing market, expected to near $100 billion by some estimates in the next decade.

Mining the metal can come at a high environmental cost, so some Alberta companies are developing greener extraction methods by partnering with an unlikely ally — the oil and gas industry.

"Working with the oil and gas industry we can take advantage of the infrastructure already existing in Alberta," said Amanda Hall, president of Summit Nanotech.

The infrastructure isn't the only advantage. The Leduc Formation, the source of Alberta's first big oil boom, is also a rich lithium deposit. There are about 3.6 million tonnes of lithium in the province, according to the Canadian Lithium Association."

January 13, 2020

CEO AMANDA HALL SELECTED FOR THE WOMEN IN CLEANTECH CHALLENGE

Calgary, Alberta / September 20, 2018

Summit Nanotech is pleased to announce CEO Amanda Hall has been selected for the Women in Cleantech Challenge offered by MaRS Discovery District (MaRS) and Natural Resources Canada (NRCan). In this competition, Amanda has been identified as a top female innovator in Canada, from 147 applicants, who is developing technology to tackle the world's most daunting energy and environmental challenges. Summit Nanotech will work closely with MaRS advisors, federal researchers and a network of experienced mentors to assist in building a high-growth business around their lithium extraction cleantech innovation. See details in the link below.

Calgary, Alberta / TheNewswire / May 8, 2018 – Voyageur Minerals Ltd . ("VM" or the “Company”) (TSX VENTURE:VM) is pleased to announce that it has signed a non-binding letter of intent (“LOI”) with Summit Nanotech Corporation (“SNC”), to develop proprietary processing technology for the production of high-purity lithium carbonate, magnesium carbonate, potassium carbonate, calcium carbonate and sodium carbonate from mineral brine waters. The technology is also envisioned to employ innovative carbon capture technology allowing VM to potentially capture CO 2 from the atmosphere to be used in the processing.

One of VM’s goals is to create efficient, environmentally friendly mining projects with reduced carbon foot prints. In addition, VM will be developing this technology for the production of High Purity Barium (HPB) products from its Frances Creek barite project.