The Solution to Our Plastics Problem Could Be under Our Feet
As a child, Molten Materials founder and CEO Shelly Zhang loved tinkering on projects with her father, a self-taught inventor. She learned how to weld, build electrical circuits, and a host of other skills. That, along with her PhD in engineering from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), would become the foundation of her adult career.
Shelly was our first guest on the fifth season of the Business for Good podcast broadcast in the New Year. She told us about Molten Material’s goal of getting plastic out of our oceans and environments and into our pavements and asphalt, where it can do some good.
Running out of space for plastic waste
Only a very small fraction of the plastic we dutifully put into our recycling bins ever ends up being recycled.
Before it responded to the pollution crisis within its borders with a new law in 2018, China spent two decades as a global dumping ground for plastic waste and other trash. In 2017 the country imported about 600,000 metric tons of discarded plastic. But now, after Chinese law has halted such imports, the US and other big creators of plastic waste products have fewer places to send them.
Shelly has figured out how to deal with our excess plastic waste by putting it to use in an environmentally friendly way. Her California-based green tech company, Molten Materials, has created a method for dissolving plastic waste and used motor oil to make a sealing material that waterproofs and extends the life of pavements and roadways.
Shelly’s goal — and her company’s — is to harness technological know-how to build more resilient and more sustainable living spaces for future generations on Earth.
Her father’s daughter
Shelly’s late father is her hero, astruggling engineer and entrepreneur who originally ran a television repair business and put her through college during tough times.
She grew up in China, where during an economic upturn, her father was starting to make good money, producing items like control panels for buildings. Then, when Shelly was in college, her father began working on making a machine to fill in cracks in asphalt for a US importer. As she helped him, Shelly realized that they shouldn’t have to depend on an intermediary, as it was only driving their profit margin lower. So, she and her father launched a business online to get the product sold in the US.
Shelly took all these experiences and perspectives with her to Caltech. She’d already worked as a young intern for an American engineering firm, and she knew that the expected nine-to-five job wasn’t going to be for her. She set her sights on building her own business early on, and her life’s work has become a tribute to her father and the skills he taught her.
In grad school, Shelly had been helping her dad on the side all along. So when he passed away, she faced a decision: continue his store, or take a job with a big corporation. She chose what her friends thought was the “irrational” option of keeping her father’s business alive.
Filling in the cracks
Shelly wrote an AI software program for the business that could spot cracks and potholes in roads. She started pitching it to investors, and the subject of plastics in landfills came up.
In 2019, the year after China stopped its importation of plastic waste, finding new methods of recycling became more urgent than ever. The US and Europe, Shelly said, experienced a “shock,” as they confronted the prospect of paying to dump their waste in landfills. Shelly knew that if she could figure out a way to upcycle the waste into filler for holes and cracks in asphalt, everyone stood a chance to win.
However, Molten Materials turns this motley crew of mixed plastics into “mush” by breaking them down through a process of thermal degradation called pyrolysis, or “cracking.” By carefully controlling the parameters by which this process operates, Shelly’s company can break down the plastics to express certain specific chemical characteristics. Molten Materials’ products are useful in filling and sealing compromised asphalt structures, while its recycling agent can be mixed with asphalt to boost temperature and load-bearing performance.
“Estée Lauder for asphalt”
Molten offers one particular product called the “Rejuvenator.” Shelly calls it “Estée Lauder for asphalt,” likening it to an “anti-aging” cream for the asphalt’s surface structure. It’s akin to infusing infrastructure with antioxidants, allowing asphalt roads to last longer.
While Molten Materials is as yet pre-revenue, an investor has already put in funding for three rounds, and the company is preparing a pilot project for a site near Sacramento. Shelly’s goal is to have the first product on the market in 2024, when the company will look at first-series funding.
Shelly’s ultimate goal is to win government contracts to move waste plastics out of landfills and into extending the useful life of roadways in municipalities and around the world. And that’s one goal we’d all like to see shift into high gear.
So check out Shelly’s and my conversation on the podcast. I think you’ll get a lot out of it!
