Timna Elements
Timna Elements recovers copper, gold, silver, and platinum-group metals from low-grade ores, mining waste, and e-waste using a low-energy, solvent-free process - no smelting, no toxic chemistry
About Us
Timna Elements is developing a sustainable hydrometallurgical platform for recovering critical metals from mining and urban waste. Our technology transforms low-value waste streams—including mine tailings, industrial residues, and electronic waste—into valuable sources of critical raw materials essential for clean energy, electrification, and advanced manufacturing.
Our proprietary process combines selective leaching, advanced separation, and metal recovery to efficiently extract target metals while minimizing chemical consumption, energy use, and secondary waste generation. Unlike conventional mining, which relies on energy-intensive extraction of virgin ores, our approach recovers existing resources already present in waste, reducing environmental impact and supporting a circular economy.
The platform is designed to be flexible and scalable, enabling recovery of multiple critical metals from diverse feedstocks. By converting waste liabilities into valuable resources, Timna Elements helps reduce dependence on primary mining, improves resource security, and lowers the carbon footprint of critical metal production.
Our mission is to make critical metals more sustainable, accessible, and resilient, accelerating the transition to a low-carbon economy while creating economic value from materials that would otherwise remain unused
Relevant Challenges
Extraction
Conventional copper extraction from sulfide ores faces a fundamental bottleneck: passivation. As leaching proceeds, a sulfur layer forms on ore surfaces that stalls the natural oxidation of ferrous iron (Fe²⁺) to ferric iron (Fe³⁺) — the active leaching agent — making recovery take months to years and rendering vast chalcopyrite deposits economically unviable by standard methods. Timna Elements addresses this directly with TLeach
, a proprietary catalytic iron regeneration module that rapidly re-oxidises Fe²⁺ back to Fe³⁺ using only ambient air — zero added chemicals. By continuously regenerating the leach solution in a closed loop, TLeach keeps the lixiviant strong and active, preventing passivation and compressing leaching cycle times from months to weeks. The regenerated solution is returned to the heap leach, creating a truly circular, low-waste process. For the separation stage, Timna’s TExtract module replaces conventional solvent extraction — which relies on organic solvents, is highly sensitive to leachate composition, and breaks down entirely for e-waste streams — with an advanced redox separation process using only hydrogen and air. Operating at ambient temperature and pressure, TExtract selectively recovers copper, silver, gold, and platinum group metals (PGMs) at purities exceeding 99%, with no cyanide, no nitric acid, and no organic solvent systems. The two modules operate as standalone units or in sequence as an end-to-end flowsheet, from raw sulfide ore to high-purity metal. The platform is modular and retrofit-ready, designed to drop into existing heap leach infrastructure with lower CAPEX and OPEX than smelting or pressure autoclaves
Closure and Remediation:
Mine tailings represent one of the largest and most intractable environmental liabilities in the extractive sector. Globally, billions of tonnes of sulfide-rich tailings — including chalcopyrite residues from decades of copper mining — sit in storage, generating acid mine drainage, leaching heavy metals into surrounding soils and water systems, and requiring indefinite containment and monitoring. The root cause is economic: conventional hydrometallurgical and pyrometallurgical processes cannot profitably recover the residual copper, silver, gold, and PGMs that remain locked in low-grade tailings after primary extraction. The metal is real — it simply cannot be unlocked at acceptable cost or environmental impact with existing technology. Timna Elements changes this equation. The TLeach catalytic iron regeneration module accelerates leaching of sulfidic tailings by continuously regenerating the ferric iron oxidant using only air, overcoming the passivation problem that makes conventional tailings retreatment uneconomic. The downstream TExtract module then selectively separates and concentrates copper, silver, gold, and PGMs from the pregnant leach solution at ambient conditions — no solvents, no hazardous reagents, no secondary waste streams. The process has been validated at laboratory scale on chalcopyrite, PCBs, alkaline batteries, and PV panels. By making residual metal recovery from tailings economically viable, Timna converts long-term environmental liabilities into productive assets, reduces the reactive sulfide mass remaining on site, and supports the responsible closure and remediation of legacy mining areas. The next generation of mining, as Timna puts it, is already above ground
Critical Raw Materials
The electronics industry’s dependence on copper, silver, gold, and platinum group metals (PGMs) is growing rapidly — driven by surging production of EVs, grid infrastructure, semiconductors, solar panels, and consumer electronics. Copper demand alone is set to double to 49 Mt by 2030. Silver faces a projected 46% demand increase and is already in its fifth consecutive annual supply deficit. Gold consumption hit an all-time high in 2025. Yet the supply chain for these metals remains heavily concentrated in primary mining, with ore grades declining roughly 30% globally — making conventional extraction increasingly costly, slow, and environmentally damaging. Meanwhile, 82 million tonnes of e-waste will be generated annually by 2030, representing a massively underutilised urban mine. Today, less than 1% of critical metals are recovered from e-waste — because existing liquid-liquid extraction technologies are highly sensitive to the complex, variable leachate compositions produced by electronic scrap and break down entirely when applied to mixed waste streams. Timna Elements’ TExtract module is specifically designed to solve this problem. Using an advanced redox separation process driven by hydrogen and air, TExtract selectively recovers copper, silver, gold, and PGMs from e-waste streams including PCBs, alkaline batteries, and end-of-life PV panels — with metal selectivity exceeding 99% and without the organic solvents, cyanide, or pH-sensitive chemistry that makes conventional processes unworkable on e-waste. The system is modular and retrofit-compatible with existing e-waste processing infrastructure, lowering the barrier to deployment for recyclers seeking to capture the full metal value of their feedstock. By unlocking economically competitive recovery of high-value metals from secondary sources, Timna supports the development of domestic, circular critical material supply chains — reducing import dependence, extending the productive lifecycle of metals already in circulation, and closing the loop on the electronics and clean energy industries’ most strategically sensitive inputs
Learn More About Us
