The millions of electric vehicle batteries already travelling North American roads could eventually help power another rapidly growing technology sector: artificial intelligence.
That was the message from Moment Energy Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer Gurmesh Sidhu at Energy Disruptors: UNITE 2026 in Calgary, where nearly 3,000 industry leaders gathered to examine the collision of energy, AI, infrastructure and geopolitics.
For the B.C.-based cleantech company, the opportunity starts with a simple idea: batteries don’t die, they retire.
Sidhu told delegates there are now more than 160 million electric vehicles worldwide, representing approximately 4,900 gigawatt-hours of battery capacity that will eventually reach the end of its automotive life.
That is roughly 17 times global demand for grid-scale battery storage in 2025, he said.
While those batteries may no longer meet the demands of an electric vehicle, Sidhu argues they can continue operating for years in stationary applications ranging from warehouses and EV charging infrastructure to large-scale data centres.
“These batteries can last over a decade in the field,” Sidhu told the Calgary audience.
Keeping Critical Minerals in North America
Moment Energy’s pitch goes beyond extending battery life.
Sidhu argued that repurposing EV batteries can help Canada and the United States retain critical minerals and reduce reliance on overseas battery supply chains.
More than 70 per cent of global critical mineral refining currently takes place in China, according to figures Sidhu presented. Instead of prematurely recycling EV batteries and potentially sending resulting materials abroad for processing, Moment wants batteries reused domestically until local refining capacity catches up.
Sidhu described the approach as a form of “urban mining” — taking battery resources already imported into North America and redeploying them as domestic energy infrastructure.
That strategy is already being scaled in British Columbia. In June, Vancouver-founded Moment Energy opened Megafactory 1 in Surrey, which the company describes as the world’s largest EV battery repurposing facility. The plant transforms retired EV batteries into energy-storage systems for data centres, hospitals, factories and microgrids, with Moment targeting one gigawatt-hour of annual battery-storage production capacity by 2030.
The milestone followed a US$40-million Series B financing that brought the company’s total funding raised to more than US$100 million.
Moment is also building another megafactory in Texas as it works to develop a larger North American supply of second-life battery storage.
Second Life as the Default
Moment has partnerships with companies including Mercedes-Benz Energy and Nissan North America and has developed technology designed specifically for repurposing EV batteries.
Sidhu said the company’s next-generation Nova Battery Storage system is designed so individual batteries can eventually be swapped out without replacing the expensive supporting infrastructure around them.
That approach could become increasingly important as electricity demand rises from AI, data centres, electrification and renewable power.
Moment has already begun exploring that connection directly. Earlier this year, the company signed an agreement with Simon Fraser University to explore energy-storage opportunities supporting AI, quantum computing and data centre infrastructure.
For Sidhu, the larger opportunity is to turn a looming battery disposal challenge into a domestic energy asset.
Moment Energy’s position is straightforward: before North America recycles millions of EV batteries, it should find ways to put them back to work.
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