Today, the industrial sector as a whole contributes to about 25% of the national Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and has been one of the major contributors to the economy in terms of employment generation. But what started as a means to ease humans’ lives has now become a major threat to their existence if not looked into carefully. The waste from the industries has the potential to contaminate the natural resources of the Earth for a very long time and can alter our environment in unimaginable ways.

Hindalco, an Aditya Birla Group company, in partnership with Manush Labs, is launching this program as an opportunity to ‘innovate to eliminate’ and aims to benefit humanity by catalyzing and empowering technological innovations in the domains of ‘clean-technology” and “circular economy”.

Winners will work on tackling the massive problem of:

700,000

tonnes/yr of FGD waste

5000

tonnes/yr of plastic

Satish Pai

Managing Director, Hindalco Industries Ltd.
Director, Board of Aditya Birla Management Corporation Pvt. Ltd.

Our strategy is to create value sustainably and operate responsibly by aligning our multi-dimensional approach with the elements of people, planet and prosperity. Our partnership with Manush Labs is a collaborative solution to reduce the environmental load and move closer to our ‘Net Zero carbon’ goal of 2050.

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Meet our champions of innovation in Bioplastics, Industrial Waste Utilization and Carbon Capture.

127

Startup Applicants

21

Countries

9

Finalist

Sampangan

INDONESIA

Converting multiple kind of unsorted waste into organic and inorganic high value materials

Zeroplast

100% home compostable materials as alternative to plastics

INDIA

TGP Bioplast

Replacing retail packaging with compostable plastics

INDIA

EnviroWaste2Wealth

Composting FGD effluents

INDIA

Carbix Corporation

Transforming effluent CO2 into carbonates and other valuable materials

USA

Saltech

INDIA

Transforming plastic, industrial and demolition waste to sustainable composite building material

AC Biode

Upcycling waste into antibacterial or absorbent materials

LUXEMBOURG/ JAPAN

Solutum

Innovative water soluble and biodegradable plastic

ISRAEL

Bio Craft Innovations

Bamboo-based granules as alternative to plastic

INDIA

Meet our champions of innovation in Bioplastics, Industrial Waste Utilization and Carbon Capture.

127

Startup Applicants

21

Countries

9

Finalist

Startup #1

INDONESIA

Converting multiple kind of unsorted waste into organic and inorganic high value materials

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Startup #4

Replacing retail packaging with compostable plastics

INDIA

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Startup #7

Composting FGD effluents

INDIA

Startup #2

100% home compostable materials as alternative to plastics

INDIA

Startup #5

Transforming effluent CO2 into carbonates and other valuable materials

USA

Startup #8

INDIA

Transforming plastic, industrial and demolition waste to sustainable composite building material

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Startup #3

Upcycling waste into antibacterial or absorbent materials

LUXEMBOURG/ JAPAN

Startup #6

Innovative water soluble and biodegradable plastic

ISRAEL

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Startup #9

Bamboo-based granules as alternative to plastic

INDIA

Paid Pilot Opportunity and possibility of scaling up with Hindalco Industries Ltd. and funding by Aditya Birla Group

Contract and Revenue

Direct large-scale opportunity to replace Hindalco's 5000 tons of plastic waste annually with innovations across technology, processes, and materials. And 700 thousand tons of FGD waste annually.

Paid Pilot

Selected startups and innovators will have an opportunity to start with a paid pilot and explore joint development opportunity in mutually agreed areas. Upon successful Pilot, Startups will potentially enter into commercial contracts with Hindalco

Potential Funding for Aditya Birla Innovation Fund

Aditya Birla Group Innovation Fund will facilitate startup engagement with other relevant of the ABG group. The selected startups will have the opportunity to receive potential funding from ABG Innovation Fund.

Problem Diagnosis and Business Development

Provide scaling to selected startups that will directly translate their efforts into substantial results. This will expectedly lead to capability building, customer outreach, and valuation gains for the startup

Joint Business Opportunity

Opportunity to jointly develop product/solve solutions for Hindalco and ABG businesses to to solve their use cases thus potential to add new revenue stream

Tech and Product Support

Technology and product
support from Manush Labs' in-house team, international network, and local partners at various stages of the program.

Inviting solutions for Plastic Packaging Replacement

Plastic reuse-and-recycling is a 60 billion dollar global opportunity waiting to be taken. From advanced feedstock recycling to novel single-material packaging that increases recyclability of the plastics in circulation, our use and abuse of plastics is ripe for disruption. With government regulations in India and beyond facilitating the change, everyone from individual to industrial bulk consumers of plastics are looking for alternative solutions so they can step up & take responsibility. Hindalco has initiated a rigorous review and reflection on their plastic waste (primarily packaging) and today is seeking out innovations and ideas to lead the movement away from conventional plastics to more sustainable materials and solutions.

Flexibles/ Film

Half of our plastic problem would disappear if we could create films and flexibles that disappear! However, beyond simply thinking of recycled, recyclable, or compostable options we need to create variety (read: “grades”) for a range of consumer & industrial applications also building in optional features like adhesive properties, branding, high strength, additional stretch, etc into our product portfolio

Industrial Carry Bags

Right from the problematic “non-woven” plastic bags used mistakenly in markets as a replacement for pure thin-film plastic bags, to garbage bags and larger industrial storage sizes (up to 1 ton!) for material handling and transportatio, this application needs a rapid reinvention

Protective Packaging Materials

Much like the infinite bubble wrap and air pouches with the consumer goods we purchase, our industrial-scale products are burdened with the same lack of a non-virgin-plastics toolkit to enable clean & effective manufacturing and delivery. Solutions could include or substitute for foamed materials and account for corner & edge protection as well

End of Life — Separation, Recycling, Composting

A systems solution to our plastics challenges today requires intervention and planning for the end of life: both for our current range of plastics that need innovation in advanced feedstock recycling & related technologies and future compostable materials. Solutions in this space could help address larger issues with organic waste as well as plaguing societies worldwide.

Inviting solutions for FGD Process Waste Utilization

Industrial power plants continue to have a presence in our domestic energy landscape. Huge amounts of emissions of harmful chemicals like CO2, NOX, and SO2, are usually present in flue gases generated by these plants. To minimize SO2 emissions, wet/semi-dry flue gas de-sulphurization technologies are being deployed in coal-based power plants. Hindalco has adopted semi-dry FGD systems at its power plants and is now looking to convert the waste into usable applications like agriculture- soil modifiers, amenders, fertilizers(FCO approved), etc, and/or construction- cement, Gypsum board, etc. Hindalco is offering its ample & growing FGD process waste resource to be tested, processed, and converted to a high-value, quality-controlled end product. In this track, we invite startups to repurpose this enormous FGD process waste into something fruitful for the planet! Suggested Solution Areas:

Agricultural Amendments

Gypsum and its component compounds are an infinitely valuable resource– for our soils! Let’s solutionize to assess the quality of our copious FGD process waste and augment the quality of our variety of soils across the country in the process

Fertilizers

Non-nitrogen based fertilizers already see the use of gypsum and are ripe for a transition to synthetic/waste gypsum with necessary solutions around processing and preprocessing, as required, creating an alternative to our petrochemical-based fertilizers

Gypsum Board (construction materials)

This robust & versatile indoor construction material is another high-value product, with some load-bearing properties, waiting for an influx of FGD gypsum waste to also increase its production and access to untapped domestic and international markets.