Congratulations you are one of the finalists of the 9th Deep Tech Award! What does the Deep Tech Award mean to you and what was the motivation behind your application?
Thank you! We look at the Deep Tech Award as a way to connect with innovative impact players in the Berlin startup ecosystem and to gain recognition. We believe that we can expand the spectrum of topics considered into sustainable mining which will become more important in the future in relation to the green energy transition.
Berlin is said to be one of the few German hubs for technological innovation. How do you experience the local tech infrastructure and how is it influenced by the Deep Tech Award?
Berlin is an excellent as well as fun place in Germany to found and run a startup. It is easy to connect and work with peers in coworking spaces and in conferences and meetings, get access to knowledge and get introduced to private and public funding. The activities around the Deep Tech Award campaign of the Berlin senate make this place even more attractive for founders.
Let’s shift the perspective and talk about you a little more. You applied with your ClimateTech solution. Please give us a little glimpse into your founding story and your key motivation to build this product.
We – André and Silko – were both searching for a startup co-founder and met online at the end of 2022. We wanted to apply our professional experience and expertise towards an enterprise that has maximum impact for our climate. To feel and experience self-efficacy was also one major driving force behind the decision to found a startup. We worked together for several weeks to define our goals for ourselves and this company and felt that we were very compatible. We went to the notary and founded the company immediately afterwards.
Why do you think Blue Skies Minerals made the finalists list and why is it Deep Tech?
Our solution is simple in its core, perfectly designed around existing mining operations and highly scalable. It requires industrial hardware, knowledge of chemistry, expertise in the processing of ore and insights into carbon accounting. When broadly implemented, it will eliminate the catastrophic release of unstable mining waste and of toxic metals, which are the key reasons why people are afraid of mining. It is a simple solution that will have a deep impact.
What is the key technological innovation within your ClimateTech solution and why does it advance the state of the art?
Our process innovation is to leverage the massive infrastructure and capability of mining to handle large quantities of materials, applying it to store large volumes of carbon in mining waste. Our technological innovation is the development of hardware that incorporates carbon in mining waste in optimal concentrations for their stable and permanent disposal.
Many people have worked for 50 years to solve the problems of toxic metal pollution and mining waste management, but a full solution has never been found. We realized that storing carbon in mining waste can solve both the problem of climate and of ecological impacts of mining. It is an elegant solution that nobody has thought of before.
What was the biggest obstacle in your developing process? How did you overcome it?
The development of the binder chemistry requires a flexible and affordable lab space, which we found at MotionLab.Berlin and the collaboration with experts from various scientific institutions. We also realized that an earlier iteration of our process was unrealistic, so we needed to adjust our process to market realities.
How do you measure the social and environmental impact of your ClimateTech solution, and what results have you seen so far?
The primary environmental impacts of our solution are the elimination of risks related to tailings dam failures and contaminant leaching into our waters, which we achieve by stabilizing mining waste physically and chemically. We also fight climate change by mineralizing excess atmospheric CO2 in mining waste. Our solution will help accelerate the energy transition by reducing permitting times for new mines, which are needed to supply materials for this transition. Our first application is currently being developed together with a pilot partner.
How do you engage with local communities or stakeholders to ensure your technology meets their needs and benefits them directly?
We run pilot campaigns together with our customers to adapt our process to their needs, involve public scientific institutions to provide impartial assessments of its benefits and involve local authorities early on.
What strategies do you have in place to scale technology and replicate its success in different regions or contexts?
Our process will benefit mines, both ecologically and in relation to climate, so they will be interested in applying it if the economics and benefits are attractive. It also solves key waste management problems. We intend to develop our first commercial plant at one mine where these problems exist, and then apply the same process at other mines that face a similar situation. We believe that the first success will give confidence to others about the validity and benefits of our process.
What are your long-term goals for Blue Skies Minerals, and how do you plan to sustain its impact over time?
We are developing various applications of our process for different waste management scenarios. Our goal is to extend carbon storage in mining waste to such a scale that it makes a positive impact on climate, and also to apply it in a way that completely eliminates the negative impacts of mining. Then our process will become indispensable for mining, in a positive way. This is our dream.
What do you wish for in our technological or digital future?
We need to think of the impact of technologies on our lives. We are living in a period where technology and our lives degrade our world and we need to reverse this. The technologies that we develop must aid in this cause.
What advice would you like to pass to young entrepreneurs and tech innovators who want to reach their goals and maybe also want to take part in the Deep Tech Award 2025? Since out of 100 applicants you made it into the finalists, we figure you have some real pro-tips here.
Part of our success draws from being ambitious in our venture, but also being honest and realistic. This has allowed us to trust each other and to go through difficult passages and stay together. The other advice is to not let ourselves be defeated by disappointments and to persevere.
Thank you so much for all your fascinating insights! Deep Tech can not wait to host you at the Deep Tech Award 2024! See you on the 11th of July!
