Tesla executives take on recycling venture

With recycling and sustainability such an important and omnipresent issue within the manufacturing industry, the worlds needs more ventures like Redwood Materials. The company will allegedly focus on the creation of technology which recycles waste manufacturing materials, although further details remain a mystery, as the website currently contains nothing.

What has thrown this obscure business into the spotlight is that two executives at Tesla, Jeffrey Straubel (Chief Technology Officer) and Andrew Stevenson (Head of Special Projects), are Directors of it.

CB Insights discovered a US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing for Redwood Materials earlier this week, and Straubel and Stevenson are listed as Chief Executives. The document also shows that $2 million has been poured into the company by a single investor, but the name of said investor is not disclosed.

While Tesla’s involvement in this venture cannot yet be gauged, it does seem a sensible partnership. As a company which creates economically-friendly electric cars, Tesla is always looking for ways to be more sustainable – particularly during the manufacturing process. It further deepened its mark on the renewable energy sector by acquiring SolarCity last year.

Tesla has been openly looking for ways to create more sustainable processes during the production of its vehicles and battery cells, and this need will only grow with the requirements of its Gigafactory.