My name is Robert Karas, the owner of Rowow LLC where we’ve developed a fully electrochemical, closed-loop process for recovering precious metals.

The idea began when I was asked by a friend to process a high-grade gold ore. Like many first-time refiners, I started with acid leaching using aqua regia. I learned a lot mostly through trial, error, and plenty of mistakes, but I kept hitting a wall: no matter what I tried, I couldn’t reliably precipitate the gold.

That frustration led to a breakthrough: I replaced chemical precipitation with electrolysis, and it worked exceptionally well. From there, I reached out to other experienced colleagues and continued to improve and evolve the system. One of the biggest upgrades was replacing nitric acid with sodium chlorate as the oxidizer. Sodium chlorate is a stronger, more capable oxidizer (able to dissolve rhodium, iridium, and other platinum group metals) while also being significantly more sustainable and cost-effective because it can be produced from salt.

Next, we engineered the process to run continuously. Our system can simultaneously plate out the precious metals and regenerate the acids/oxidizers, allowing ongoing leaching without the typical waste streams or repeated chemical makeups.

As I learned more about the industry, several major gaps became clear:
There are few viable alternatives to existing methods, many of which generate significant pollution and toxic waste.
Most processes struggle with platinum group metals often focusing only on gold and silver.
Many conventional approaches are expensive and/or low-yield, sometimes leaving substantial value behind (even missing large portions of the gold).

In the United States, there’s essentially no robust platinum group metal industry. Getting material analyzed, refined, and sold can be slow, costly, or simply not feasible. Often requiring overseas shipment and long turnaround times.
Seeing both the technical advantages and the scale of the problem, I realized this technology could have far greater impact than I could ever achieve alone. That’s why our intention is to open-source our work.
https://github.com/Rowow1/Open-sourced-off-the-shelf-ion-exchange-membrane

Every week, new headlines highlight the environmental damage caused by various industries such as manufacturing and mining:
Tailing creating pollution
Dam failures contaminating waterways
Mercury from illegal operations harming ecosystems
At the end of it all, communities suffer the consequences.

In response, many governments have imposed strict restrictions or outright bans, largely because there hasn’t been a practical, cleaner alternative.

We believe sustainable, closed-loop extraction changes that equation. It can unlock entirely new markets: recovering valuable metals from legacy waste and dump sites, and enabling development in areas previously deemed too environmentally risky using traditional methods.

https://www.youtube.com/@Rowow