Homeostasis co-founder and CEO Makoto Eyre cites a famous Eisenhower line to capture his current leadership mindset: “Plans are worthless, but planning is everything.” It’s an apt motto for a startup trying to build a business at the intersection of climate policy, trade wars and the global race for battery materials.
The Seattle-area startup is developing technology that converts captured carbon dioxide into graphite — a critical material for batteries that power EVs, drones and grid energy storage.
But today’s topsy-turvy geopolitical landscape is creating opportunities and challenges for Homeostasis that flip flop over time.
While the Trump administration is uninterested in carbon removal as a climate strategy, it’s enthusiastic about domestic graphite production — an apparent bright spot for the startup. But tariffs on Chinese graphite, which now total roughly 200%, risk depressing the broader battery sector, potentially shrinking the market that Homeostasis is counting on.
In December, the startup announced a strategic partnership and funding from LAB7, the investment arm of Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil giant Aramco. The collaboration will help Homeostasis scale its plant operations and refine its graphite processing to ensure it reaches “drop-in” status for battery manufacturers. The deal is being driven by Saudi Arabia’s goal of quickly building a domestic EV supply chain.
Aiming for U.S.-made graphite
Homeostasis is also eager to supply graphite to North American customers, hoping to one day compete against China, which produces more than 90% of the world’s battery-grade graphite.
Commercial graphite mining largely ceased in the U.S. in 1950s, and domestic production is just restarting. Synthetic graphite can be produced as a byproduct of crude oil refining, but creating a battery-grade material requires a costly, lengthy and energy-intensive process.
The startup takes a different approach. Its molten salt electrolysis process runs electricity through a high-temperature salt mixture containing dissolved CO2 captured from industrial operations. The carbon deposits onto an electrode as crystalline graphite, with oxygen released as a byproduct.
CEO Eyre and an engineer are based in Tacoma, Wash., while a three-person science team led by co-founder Julien Lombardi works out of New York.
Homeostasis last year raised a $600,000 pre-seed investment and $700,000 from Washington’s Climate Commitment Act. The company is hiring engineers in Washington and plans to double its headcount by the end of the year.
‘Setting the course’
Homeostasis is currently building a prototype that will produce 1 kilogram — just over two pounds — of graphite daily, primarily to provide samples to Aramco. Within two years, the team aims to open a pilot plant capable of generating tens of tons annually.
The longer-term goal is a self-contained system that fits inside a single 40-foot shipping container and produces 100 tons of graphite per year. Homeostasis plans to deploy the units at automakers or energy companies that have existing carbon capture infrastructure.
The U.S. traps an estimated 30 million to 50 million metric tons of CO2 annually, though most is currently used for enhanced oil recovery — representing a vast potential feedstock if the economics pencil out. Based on battery-demand projections, the startup estimates that the U.S. and Canada will need roughly 1 million tons of graphite per year by the end of this decade.
For Eyre, the current volatility is noise. What matters is the underlying signal: a global shift toward electrification that will require energy storage at a scale the world has never seen.
“To support that we need critical materials, and they need to be low cost,” he said. “While the policy details might be shifting over time, we’re building solid fundamentals. We are setting the course.”
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