Silicon, the quiet titan of modern technology, commands a market ten to fifteen times larger than rare earths, yet it still glides under mainstream investors’ radar. That paradox is precisely what drew InvestorNews host Jack Lifton to Brian Leeners, CEO and Director of Homerun Resources Inc. (TSXV: HMR | OTCQB: HMRFF), a Brazilian-based upstart determined to rewrite the global supply story for ultra-high-purity silica.
Homerun styles itself as “a vertically integrated materials leader revolutionizing green energy solutions through advanced silica technologies,” and Leeners wasted no time arguing why the claim is more than marketing gloss. “We’ve really built a platform based on a core asset—our high-quality, high-purity silica in Brazil,” he told Lifton. From that platform, he explained, spring four converging businesses: purifying quartz to 99.99-plus percent; turning that feedstock into solar glass for Brazil’s booming photovoltaic market; folding the material into a Department of Energy (DoE)–backed long-duration energy-storage system; and marrying all of it with an AI-driven energy-management platform.
Lifton, who began refining silicon at Westinghouse in the 1960s, conceded the company had escaped even his seasoned gaze. “I didn’t know that you existed,” he admitted, calling Homerun’s strategy “in the very top tier of vertical material industries.” The hosts’ astonishment mirrored a broader industry blind spot: while investors chase lithium and nickel headlines, semiconductor-grade silica remains overwhelmingly Chinese-controlled, a fact Leeners intends to change. “It’s going to take new techniques to change that dominance,” he said. “We’re pretty good at the creativity.”
Those techniques include a collaboration with UC Davis to replace heat-hungry, carbon-heavy furnaces with “thermoelectric” purification that uses electricity to do the heavy lifting. Leeners described proof-of-concept results that already meet electronics-grade thresholds, adding that the same method can drive quartz directly to silicon metal or into silicon-graphite mixes such as silicon carbide. “If you want to be in the silicon space effectively, you’re going to need a new way to produce silicon because the Chinese dominate,” he said.
Commercial scale is next. On July 9 the company disclosed a second competitive bid to build Latin America’s first dedicated solar-glass plant, a 1,000-ton-per-day facility budgeted at roughly €150 million. The German consortium GS Engineering, combining Grenzebach and Sorg, joins HORN Glass Industries AG on the shortlist. A memorandum of understanding with the municipality of Belmonte, Bahia, has already secured land and infrastructure adjacent to Homerun’s silica resource, streamlining logistics from quarry to furnace.
Solar glass is more than a side project; it is the company’s margin fulcrum. “Silica is the biggest component of solar glass,” Leeners said, noting that his raw quartz can feed furnaces straight from the wash-and-sort plant—no costly pre-processing required. That purity edge, he argues, will let Homerun sell “the best quality solar glass in the world” while leveraging Brazil’s own solar-installation boom.
Energy-storage ambitions run in parallel. At the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Colorado, Homerun’s sand is being engineered into “Enduring,” a long-duration thermal battery that stores electricity as heat inside silica and releases it on demand. If successful, the project could offer an alternative to lithium-ion batteries for industrial heat or grid-scale power. “Electricity in, heat stored, electricity and heat out,” Leeners summarized. The company is also exploring silicon-enhanced graphite anodes, betting that hybrid chemistries will dominate next-generation lithium-ion cells.
Lifton pressed him on timelines. While exact production dates remain fluid, Leeners said the solar-glass plant’s bankable feasibility study is underway and the purification circuit design is being costed by Dorner German Engineering. He added that Homerun has begun acquiring European distribution assets to create “pull-through” demand for its materials: “You not only create push for your products, but you create pull.”
Investor interest may hinge on margins as much as mission, and here Leeners was blunt. “If you’re selling raw commodity, you’re making lesser margin. If you’re using your own product in the industrial material space, you’re getting better margin,” he said. Achieving four-nines purity opens the top of the pricing pyramid—a realm Lifton knows well from his semiconductor days. “You kill yourself to make ultra-high-purity material just so you can then contaminate it again,” the veteran chemist quipped, half-joking at the irony of precision doping.
The irony is not lost on Homerun, which pitches its three-phase roadmap as both profitable and virtuous. By harnessing zero-waste thermoelectric purification, AI-optimized energy management, and regionally sourced renewables, the company insists it can undercut Chinese incumbents on carbon intensity and cost. “We maintain an uncompromising commitment to ESG principles,” Leeners said, pointing to local jobs in Bahia and the promise of a solar-glass supply chain that never leaves Latin America.
Lifton left his audience with a reminder that the silicon market’s sheer scale eclipses its rare earth cousin many times over—a fact Wall Street forgets at its peril.
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