(A spin-off, spin-up plan for space recycling)
We want to establish a series of businesses that complement each other nicely. A Pick-A-Pull discount auto parts supplier, an auto scrapyard, and an advanced aerospace additive manufacturing facility. Two are proven profitable businesses. The third is an additive manufacturing facility, which upcycles to maximize profits. This project is meant to fulfill a national objective of creating and strengthening an efficient supply chain while reducing foreign dependence on materials and manufacturing. It is also a technology accelerator for an ambitious plan to recycle space debris. Most importantly, it is designed to make money.
What are we manufacturing? The best parts to manufacture as a precursor for space recycling would be aerospace parts. However, getting FAA certification for new parts or processes can take years. Even rocket and satellite parts are easier to certify. Aerospace parts are a long-term goal. In the meantime, we would be manufacturing marine parts for boats. Machine parts for factories and windmills. Rare auto parts for cars that haven’t been manufactured in many years, and other difficult-to-make high-value custom parts. Our ability to manufacture different things quickly without retooling facilities allows us to meet time-sensitive deadlines.
The first business is a Pick-A-Part auto parts supplier. A Pick-A-Part allows customers to take parts directly off totaled cars at a fraction of the average cost. It would operate using a standard tried and true Pick-A-Part business model. Every part is cataloged and priced out. There is an entrance fee. Customers bring their own tools, strip the parts off cars themselves, and pay significantly reduced costs at the register. Owning and operating a pick-a-part ensures materials availability while turning a profit from what would typically be a warehousing and storage expense.
The second business is an auto scrapyard. This is also an established profitable business. Cars that have been picked over or destroyed and broken parts are made back into raw materials using a series of processes. It would function using the standard business model with a few minor augmentations. The final product would be powder. We would need a plasma torch to ensure the proper consistency of the powder. We wouldn’t need as much material as a traditional auto scrapyard and could build something significantly smaller.
There are several big players in auto recycling. The biggest in the United States is Schnitzer Steel. They have been in business for over 100 years, running scrap yards and pick-n-pulls. They do not manufacture anything. Instead, most materials are shipped back to China.
A second assessment is performed on our pre-processed materials. This assessment considers the material composition and makeup and what would be involved in processing raw materials. This is followed by de-pollution, which consists in removing hazardous materials and fluids like engine oil, coolant, and gasoline to prevent environmental contamination. Next, valuable components such as engines, transmissions, and electronic modules are removed and sorted for resale or remanufacturing. Plastic and fabric elements are removed.
The car is stripped and sorted based on material composition as best as possible. The frame, chassis, and whatever else is left is then crushed and shredded. A powerful magnet separates ferrous metals, while non-ferrous metals are sorted using technologies like Eddy current separators. Typically, these materials are smelted into ingots and sold overseas for re-manufacturing. We would be grinding the materials down for onsite manufacturing instead. The project’s success depends on our ability to create high-purity metal powder feedstock for additive manufacturing.
Creating high-purity powder involves a process called plasma atomization. The materials are fed through a plasma torch. It generates a high-temperature plasma arc, typically around 10,000 C°. As the metal flows through the plasma arc, it is bombarded with an inert gas at high velocity (argon or nitrogen). The gas jets break the molten metal into tiny balls, sorted by size, to ensure uniformity in the printing process.
Other materials must also be processed, handled, sold, or safely disposed of. Nothing prevents us from running additional plastic, glass, and carbon fiber production lines.
Recycling oil and batteries are two well-established industries with a long history of profitability. Like the pick-a-part business model, batteries and motor oil can be easily refurbished and resold. This is especially beneficial, as both commodities significantly negatively impact the environment.
The third business stands apart by leveraging cutting-edge technologies, like Additive Manufacturing (AM), or 3D printing, to redefine production capabilities. This is the project’s core, tapping into the unique value of AM already embraced by space companies for creating limited-run, custom parts—an otherwise prohibitively expensive process with traditional machining methods.
There are several techniques for 3D printing high-quality metallic components. They all use powder feedstock. If we can maintain the purity of the feedstock, there should not be any new problems.
Direct Metal Laser Sintering (DMLS): This is the most common method for 3D printing superalloys. It involves using a laser to sinter powdered metal, typically layer by layer until a final product is formed. DMLS can produce highly complex geometries that are often difficult or impossible to achieve with traditional manufacturing methods.
Electron Beam Melting (EBM): Like DMLS, EBM uses an electron beam instead of a laser to melt the metal powder. EBM operates in a vacuum and is particularly useful for printing components from reactive superalloys, such as those containing high titanium and aluminum levels.
Selective Laser Melting (SLM): This technique uses a laser to fully melt the metal powder, rather than just sintering it, creating a typically denser part with better mechanical properties than DMLS.
The project focuses on high-end parts made from Aluminum and steel alloys. We can also mix super-alloys on the fly, such as Inconel 625 and 718, which are mainly nickel-based. This allows us to make advanced parts. Titanium can be used for additive manufacturing but has only 60% of its original strength after recycling. Hyphen Innovations has an alternative method for making turbine blades from aluminum instead of titanium.
Glass is easily recycled. However, aerospace components using glass, such as windshields and optical glass, require a purity not customarily achieved using standard recycling techniques. To complicate matters, auto glass is usually laminated and layered with polyvinyl butyral (PVB). This makes the process particularly challenging. Unfortunately, our best option is to crush and separate the glass into cullets, selling the material on the open market for less demanding applications.
Plastic has its own set of problems. We can recycle plastic and make parts, but most aerospace-grade plastic components are out of reach. Plastic can be used to make models and molds. We could also print seat parts, plastic panels, and other non-essential components.
Carbon fiber and fiberglass present significant challenges. The easiest solution for fiberglass and carbon fiber is to downcycle into construction materials. There are a few other options, including waste to power (WTP). Current WTP technology is not environmentally friendly when applied to fiberglass or carbon fiber.
Relativity Space constructs their entire rocket—fuel tanks, engines, and all—using 3D printing. However, their proprietary equipment is unlikely to be accessible for this project. The most significant player in 3D printed aerospace additive manufacturing is Colibrium, which General Electric owns as part of GE Aerospace. They have a separate company called AP&C, or “Advanced Powders,” which produces aerospace-grade powders for 3D printing.
Thinking small: Investing in a Pick-N-Pull recycling facility and manufacturing plant might be overly ambitious. A more practical approach could involve starting with an auto mechanic shop, a smaller materials processing facility, and an additive manufacturing plant. If the ultimate goal is space recycling, the most critical investment may be designing the entire operation as compact and efficient as possible.
The project’s lean advantage. One of the aspects of ‘lean’ businesses is their ability to not have too much product sitting in warehouses. We address that using the pick-a-part auto lot as our raw materials storage facility. We do not recycle materials we are not using or selling in the immediate future. Our production facility’s small-scale, high-value element ensures we don’t need to make components without a sales contract. By creating nested facilities and our supply chain, we also minimize the need for shipping.
On-Demand. We would likely build our manufacturing facility near a small airport to manufacture and deliver a part within 24 hours.
Factory Automation and AI. One of the main hindrances to creating a circular, sustainable economy is the sheer amount of manpower required to run a recycling plant. The trash sorting process alone can require hundreds of people. The project can leverage and develop new robotics and artificial intelligence technologies to innovate every process across three industries.
Compliance. The FAA is very strict about aerospace parts manufacturing. Complying with regulations and making parts up to snuff is a significant challenge. The plant would likely start with something less ambitious, such as manufacturing parts for discontinued cars and boats. For aerospace parts to be AS9100 certified, A battery of tests needs to be performed. These include heat and cold resistance tests, turbulence, durability, and load-bearing tests. The good news is that we are emerging with new technologies that could significantly reduce testing time and cost and allow us to test more on-site. Hyphen Innovations, in partnership with GE Aerospace, has been building a series of small FAA-certified machines to test additive-manufactured aerospace parts. More essential components must be flown on test aircraft before certification. For some parts, the process can take up to three years. We would like to have the parts certified in 5 hours.
Environmental Concerns. No lies: recycling is a dirty business. There is no way around it. Manufacturing is a dirty business. Again, there is no way around it. Steel production is the biggest polluter in the world. Manufacturing isn’t far behind. Even the Pick-N-Pull creates toxic waste. Anti-freeze, paint coatings, used oil, heavy metals, etc. Smelting will consume a massive amount of energy. Outside of Aluminum, metal recycling is also dirty. Fortunately, additive manufacturing is relatively clean compared to traditional means. This is the ugly stretch of a sustainable circular economy.
Here is what we can do for free.
Reduce international shipping pollution. Limiting the import and export of raw materials can prevent pollution from overseas shipping.
Only manufacturing what we need. Our system is designed to fulfill small orders, so there shouldn’t be any leftover unsold products.
Minimizing waste. Additive manufacturing generally doesn’t leave excess unused material. When it does, we can easily add that material back into our stockpile for reuse.
While profitability and our ability to sustain and grow must be our main priorities, using this technology accelerator to develop and implement green technologies would be amazing. However, it would require significantly more investment and a higher upkeep.
One example is a solar furnace. Odellio is a solar furnace built during the 1960’s in France. It uses direct sunlight powered by mirrors to smelt down metals. This would eliminate or reduce the reliance on fossil fuels to power the scrapyard. However, it would only be able to operate during the daytime with good weather conditions.
Another area where there could be significant improvement with substantial technological increases is waste-to-power. There are already several waste-to-power plants in the world. The main problem is how clean they burn. As with the rest of the project, we should have ample materials to fuel a small power plant.
Demand. The Aerospace industry is over 100 years old. There have been countless models and designs. Some planes that were built over 60 years ago are still in service. One example is the B-52. Many original production facilities have been shut down or have pivoted to manufacture more modern models. There is an opportunity to manufacture very short runs of custom parts that are no longer available. For more modern aircraft, there are instances where repair and assembly facilities need parts as fast as possible.
Jobs. Working at a pick-n-pull or auto scrapyard probably isn’t on anyone’s dream job list. However, it’s a job with benefits. Hard work and decent pay. For someone with no skills, it could be a great opportunity. Aspects of the recycling scrap yard and most of the manufacturing plant will have to have a skilled workforce.
This would include engineers. mechanical, electrical, industrial, and aerospace, all with experience in additive manufacturing. At least one material science expert. An FAA compliance expert. A supply chain expert (Six Sigma Black Belt
or equivalent). A sales team of at least three, including someone dedicated to government sales and compliance. One private industry salesperson and an inside sales researcher. A program and project manager. A CMMC cyber security expert and basic IT. A CTO, CFO, CEO. All of these are working positions. The CFO would have to help with sales, investment, and accounting. The CTO would help with engineering and materials science. The CEO would be responsible for payroll and HR. Depending on the investment, a board of directors would likely be needed.
Very Vague Cost estimates:
Pink-N-Pull Setup $900k – $3mil operating costs $400k – $1.2million
Auto Scrapyard refining plant Setup $2.5 million – 5 million + $300k – $500k yearly. This estimate may be low due to the nature of our specific remanufacturing processes. Metals recycling plants don’t usually have plasma arc welders. Our sorting system needs to be a bit more accurate, etc. We also need some serious materials testing lab equipment, which won’t be cheap.
Additive manufacturing plant? I don’t have a good number for this yet, other than to say. The salaries alone will be more than 2 million a year.