In an exclusive interview with CanadianSME Small Business Magazine, Nick Nesbitt, Founder and CEO of Mapleview Energy, shares his vision for transforming Canada’s EV and energy sectors through intelligent circular battery solutions. With a focus on repurposing electric vehicle batteries for commercial, agricultural, and industrial applications, Nesbitt is advancing a practical, homegrown battery circular economy that combines diagnostics, AI-enabled battery management, and energy optimization.
Interview By Kripa Anand
Nick Nesbitt is the Founder and CEO of Mapleview Energy, a Toronto-based cleantech company developing intelligent circular energy storage solutions using repurposed electric vehicle batteries. He founded the company in 2024 after identifying a significant opportunity to extend the life of EV batteries through advanced energy storage applications that reduce costs, lower emissions, and strengthen the circular economy.
Nick has spent nearly a decade working across cleantech, circular economy, renewable energy, and waste-to-value businesses. Prior to founding Mapleview Energy, he served as Senior Business Development Manager at Generate Upcycle, the waste-to-value platform of Generate Capital, one of North America’s leading sustainable infrastructure investment firms. There, he developed food waste and renewable natural gas (RNG) commercialization strategies, secured long-term agreements with municipalities, utilities, and industrial customers, supported more than $18 million in annual recurring revenue, contributed to a $120 million long-term infrastructure agreement, and led carbon credit strategies under Canada’s Clean Fuel Regulations.
Prior to Generate Upcycle, Nick served as Operations & Contracts Manager at ORCA Digesters, where he helped scale the company’s clean technology manufacturing operations and commercial service offerings. Earlier, he worked as a Business Analyst with Minus Global, supporting market research, technology commercialization, and growth initiatives that contributed to securing $4.5 million in growth capital while evaluating emerging opportunities in waste technology, sustainability, and battery repurposing.
At Mapleview Energy, Nick leads corporate strategy, fundraising, commercialization, and partnership development across the battery supply chain. He works closely with automotive OEMs, battery recyclers, research institutions, fleet operators, utilities, and commercial and industrial energy users to accelerate the adoption of second-life battery energy storage systems.
Under his leadership, Mapleview Energy has secured more than $1 million in combined investment and non-dilutive funding and is advancing pilot deployments alongside industry and academic partners, including Ontario Tech University.
Nick holds degrees in Political Science and Environmental Science from Rochester Institute of Technology, as well as a Master of Science in Sustainability and an LLM in International Law from Durham University.
Canada has invested billions in EV and battery manufacturing, yet most conversations stop at getting vehicles on the road. From your vantage point, are we paying enough attention to what happens to those batteries once they leave the road, and what first drew you personally to that “second‑life” part of the story?
We are not yet giving enough attention to what happens after an EV battery’s first life in a vehicle. Public discussions largely focus on adoption, charging, and manufacturing, which are important. However, most people rarely consider what happens to materials once a product reaches the end of its use, whether it is a vehicle, tire, or battery.
What first drew me to this space was studying at Rochester Institute of Technology, where one of my professors spoke a lot about the business opportunities that can be created from waste streams and end-of-first-life materials. That really stuck with me. It led me to pursue graduate studies in sustainability, with a focus on emerging perspectives and technologies in waste management. While I was at Durham University in the UK, one of my professors pushed me to look more closely at electric vehicles and battery reuse. At the time, in 2019 and 2020, the conversation around reuse, repurposing, and recycling was much less developed than it is today. That is where the idea really started.
For readers who may not know what happens behind the scenes, what typically happens to an EV battery after it’s removed from a vehicle, and what environmental and economic benefits can be unlocked by extending its life in stationary energy storage before it ever reaches a recycler?
Today, the pathway for an EV battery after removal from a vehicle remains unclear and less standardized than it needs to be. In Ontario, I often receive calls from auto recyclers, fleets, and businesses asking what to do with damaged, overstocked, excess, or idle batteries. Some packs come from accidents, but others may simply be stranded inventory, warranty returns, development packs, or batteries that no longer fit their original use case.
That is where I think there is a real service opportunity. OEMs, recyclers, dealers, and industrial users need trusted partners who can assess batteries safely and determine the best next step. From a technical perspective, removal from a vehicle, or never making it into one, does not automatically mean that a battery has no value. Many battery packs still have useful capacity, but they require proper testing, diagnostics, safety review, battery management, and sometimes cell reconditioning through controlled protocols.
The environmental benefit is that we can extend the useful life of materials that are energy-intensive to mine, process, and manufacture. The economic benefit is lower-cost storage, local energy resilience, and new value before the battery ultimately reaches a recycler.
Electrification, AI infrastructure, and data centres are all pushing electricity demand higher at the same time as grids are under strain. How can second‑life EV batteries help address this growing demand—whether for commercial and industrial operations, fleet depots, or making Canada’s electricity grid more resilient and affordable?
Second-life EV batteries can help by creating an opportunity to add energy storage closer to where electricity is actually used. As electricity demand grows from electrification, AI infrastructure, data centres, fleets, and industrial operations, the grid will need more flexibility. Storage can help reduce peak demand, shift energy use to lower-cost periods, provide backup power, and support sites that want to integrate more renewable energy.
I think one area that deserves more attention is agriculture and rural energy infrastructure. Much of the discussion around electrification focuses on cities, data centres, and large industrial loads, but farms, rural businesses, medium-sized commercial properties, and remote operations also need reliable and affordable power. Many of these sites have land, solar potential, large equipment loads, and resilience needs, but they are often overlooked.
Second-life batteries can be part of that solution. They can support microgrids, farm energy systems, commercial and industrial operations, fleet depots, and community-scale resilience projects. The opportunity is not only to store electricity but to make the grid more flexible, local, and affordable.
You’ve described Mapleview Energy as building “intelligent circular energy storage solutions” at the intersection of battery diagnostics, management systems, AI, and energy optimization. Why is battery circularity becoming increasingly important to Canada’s clean energy transition, and how can the country position itself as a global leader in lifecycle management and circular economy innovation?
Battery circularity is becoming increasingly important because Canada is not just trying to electrify transportation. We are also trying to build a more resilient, affordable, and secure clean energy system. Batteries sit at the centre of that transition, but if we only focus on manufacturing and vehicle deployment, we miss a huge part of the opportunity.
For Mapleview Energy, circularity means understanding the battery across its full lifecycle. That includes diagnostics, safety assessment, battery management systems, AI-supported monitoring, energy optimization, second-life deployment, and eventual recycling. The goal is not to treat recycling as the only solution. The goal is to recover as much useful value as possible before recycling becomes the final step.
Canada has the automotive base, clean technology talent, electricity expertise, mining sector, and research capacity to lead in this space. But to do that, we need to build the full lifecycle infrastructure here. If batteries and critical materials simply leave the country, and other markets build the reuse, repurposing, and lifecycle-management systems around them, Canada risks missing the next major phase of the battery economy.
The opportunity is to make Canada a leader not only in producing batteries, but in managing them intelligently from first use to second life to final recovery.
Mapleview has already secured over $1 million in funding and is advancing pilot deployments with partners like Ontario Tech University, while working across the battery supply chain from automakers to recyclers and industrial users. Looking ahead five to ten years, what does success look like for Canada’s battery ecosystem, and what opportunities do you see this creating for Canadian businesses, communities, and investors?
In the next five to ten years, success will mean Canada has established a complete battery ecosystem, extending beyond manufacturing. This includes designing, using, recovering, testing, repurposing, redeploying, and responsibly recycling batteries through defined pathways.
At Mapleview Energy, success means contributing to Ontario’s battery infrastructure. We operate across the value chain, from battery supply and diagnostics to energy storage deployment, monitoring, maintenance, and recycling. We have secured over $1 million through grants, R&D partnerships, and equity investment, and are advancing pilot projects with partners such as Ontario Tech University, Ontario Vehicle Innovation Network, Ontario Centre of Innovation and CASPRI.Our goal is to demonstrate how second-life batteries can meet commercial and industrial energy needs.
Looking ahead, I see a major opportunity for Ontario and Canada to create companies, jobs, and technical expertise around some of the hardest problems of the future: clean energy, critical minerals, grid resilience, and circularity. If we build this sector properly, we can retain talent here, create skilled jobs, support local communities, and provide investors with a practical market at the intersection of energy storage, waste reduction, and grid modernization.
My longer-term vision is for Canada to become a leader in battery lifecycle management
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this interview are those of the interviewee and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of CanadianSME Small Business Magazine. Our platform is dedicated to fostering dialogue and sharing insights that inspire and empower small and medium-sized businesses across Canada.
