CEO & Co-founder, SusMaX
Mo Balapour is the CEO and Co-founder of SusMaX, a company pioneering the recycling of landfilled, off-spec coal ash into high-performance lightweight aggregate for the construction industry through its patented thermochemical technology. He founded SusMaX in 2021 after earning his Ph.D. in Civil Engineering–Materials from Drexel University, where his research focused on upcycling hard-to-recycle coal ash into value-added products. SusMaX is developing its first commercial-scale facility in Pennsylvania to address two critical challenges: (1) the underutilization of vast reserves of off-spec coal ash and (2) the construction sector’s growing demand for locally sourced, sustainable lightweight aggregate. The company recently completed a continuous, tonnage-scale pilot demonstration of its proprietary process in Whitehall, PA, in collaboration with three major utilities. Before launching SusMaX, Mo worked at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, contributing to materials research for infrastructure applications.