Status: 25.10.2023, 19:00 PM
By: Momir Takac
CommentsShare
Redwood and Li-Cycle want to revolutionize battery recycling. To this end, the start-ups developed new methods and their own systems.
Munich - Two start-ups from North America want to capitalize on the energy transition and the associated transformation to electric cars. Li-Cycle from Canada and Redwood from the USA are targeting battery recycling and are investing heavily - also in Germany.
Recycling start-ups want to recycle 95 percent of battery scrap
The companies want to achieve a recycling rate of 95 percent, which is far from being achieved so far, reports the Handelsblatt. With conventional recycling methods of lithium-ion batteries, for example, the valuable lithium cannot be recovered. It ends up in the unusable slag. Lithium is the raw material for the batteries that are installed in everyday devices such as smartphones and notebooks, but also in electric cars.
How to recycle electric car batteries efficiently? Two North American start-ups have ideas. (Symbolic image) © picture alliance/dpa | Julian Stratenschulte
Li-Cycle and Redwood want to recycle it as a raw material. As well as other critical metals of the "black mass", such as nickel, cobalt or copper. To this end, they are working on new recycling methods that allow lithium-ion batteries to be almost completely recycled. The processes are similar: battery scrap is first shredded. Subsequently, the black mass is isolated from other metal parts. In the last step - and this is the special thing - the valuable metals are separated from each other by means of acid in a hydrometallurgical process. A research team from Saarbrücken has developed a process to extract lithium from seawater.
Li-Cycle and Redwood work in Magdeburg and Bremerhaven
One of the first of three planned production lines of the system, which Li-Cycle developed in-house, has been in regular operation in Magdeburg since the beginning of October. "We can process the old batteries in any shape and size, in a charged state and without disassembling the batteries. This gives us a competitive advantage," manager Udo Schleif told Handelsblatt. Currently, 10,000 tons of battery scrap can be processed into several thousand tons of black mass. In the future, this figure is expected to rise to 30,000 tonnes.
Redwood, which was founded by former Tesla executive Jeffrey Brian Straubel in 2018, recently began operating a plant in Bremerhaven. There, too, 10,000 tons of battery scrap can already be processed annually. According to Straubel, this corresponds to the amount of around 20,000 lithium-ion batteries in electric cars. In Baden-Württemberg, a plant for the climate-neutral mining of lithium recently went into operation.
Experts expect almost six million tons of lithium-ion scrap by 2040
"It is foreseeable that the demand for recycling capacity will increase significantly," Alexander Franke, partner and expert for energy and commodity trading at the consulting firm Oliver Wyman, told Handelsblatt. There is already a fierce battle for raw materials. After the U.S. tightened restrictions on the export of certain semiconductors to China, Beijing responded with export restrictions on key materials used to make electric car batteries, such as graphite.
0
Read also
0
After Hallhuber, Reno and Co.: Next well-known fashion chain begins insolvency proceedings
READ
"Fat years are over": pension system on the verge of collapse
READ3
Is there a chocolate shock at Advent? The EU's largest cocoa supplier under pressure
READ
What happens if two electric cars collide with each other? Mercedes shows the result
READ
Applying for a pension subsidy: Application deadline extended until the end of January
READ
Fancy a voyage of discovery?
My Area
Experts expect that between 2030 and 2040, the number of used batteries in electric cars will increase massively. A study by RWTH Aachen University and the consulting firm Strategy& calculated that up to six million tons of lithium-ion scrap are likely to be produced. A Munich-based start-up is taking a completely different approach. It wants to produce batteries that are not based on lithium. (mt)