India’s fast-growing appetite for electronics, electric vehicles and clean energy technologies is creating a less visible but increasingly urgent challenge: what happens to materials once products reach the end of their life. Attero’s decision to invest nearly ₹150 crore to expand its recycling and R&D footprint suggests that the answer may lie not in mines, but in cities.
The company’s new facilities—spanning e-waste recycling plants in Pune, Bengaluru and Faridabad, a copper recycling unit in Rajasthan’s Reengus, and an upgraded R&D Centre of Excellence in Greater Noida—reflect a strategic shift in how India approaches critical minerals. Rather than relying solely on imports or fresh extraction, Attero is scaling what is often called “urban mining”: recovering valuable metals from discarded electronics and batteries already circulating within the economy.
This approach is particularly relevant given India’s annual generation of over 3.8 million tonnes of e-waste, much of which still flows through informal channels. These unregulated systems are inefficient, environmentally damaging and unsafe for workers. By formalising recycling with industrial-scale plants and traceable processes, Attero is addressing not just waste management, but supply chain resilience. Metals recovered through controlled recycling can be tracked, certified and reused by manufacturers increasingly under pressure to meet ESG and regulatory standards.
The expansion will lift Attero’s processing capacity to 2,44,000 tonnes per year, supported by advanced technologies such as robotic dismantling lines, automated battery cutting systems and energy-efficient recovery processes. These are not cosmetic upgrades. Automation and precision are essential for safely extracting metals like lithium, cobalt, nickel and rare earths—materials that underpin India’s ambitions in electric mobility, renewable energy and electronics manufacturing.
There is also a broader economic dimension. The creation of an estimated 800–1,000 jobs across operations, engineering and research points to the emergence of recycling as a skilled industrial sector rather than a peripheral activity. Over time, this could help India build domestic expertise in metallurgical innovation, reducing dependence on foreign processing technologies.
Looking ahead, Attero’s move hints at how India’s critical minerals ecosystem may evolve. As global competition for resources intensifies and geopolitical risks reshape supply chains, the ability to recover over 22 critical metals domestically could become a strategic advantage. If supported by consistent policy enforcement and producer responsibility frameworks, urban mining could shift from a niche solution to a core pillar of India’s industrial and sustainability strategy.
In that sense, Attero’s expansion is less about capacity alone and more about redefining where India looks for its next generation of raw materials.
