An aluminum can is more powerful than you imagine. A great deal of electricity was needed to refine the metal from raw ore, and that energy is still there, trapped in the metal. That energy could heat buildings, power factories, and maybe even light our homes. It’s just a matter of getting at it.
A Boston startup called Found Energy says it knows how to do just that.
Co-founder and chief executive Peter Godart says that the company has developed a way to coat refined aluminum with a chemical catalyst that combines with water to turn the aluminum back into the raw material from which it was made...