EV batteries are still useful even if they are no longer able to propel a vehicle
SUPPLY CRUNCH
Squeeze predicted on battery materials as EV demand continues to rise BEYOND CARS
Some batteries can be used in stationary applications providing electricity storage once their usefulness has ended within vehicles KEY QUOTE
It makes neither economic nor environmental sense for EV batteries to be dumped in landfill—it just won’t happen
The rise of electric vehicles (EVs) is placing a serious demand on the battery sector. As the number of vehicles grows, so too will the number of batteries. But this raises the question of what happens to these components at the end of their useful life inside a car. Like many other sectors, the EV battery market is looking to improve its circularity by reusing or recycling materials. There are two primary main drivers for this. Firstly, batteries are the most expensive and environmentally damaging component of EVs or hybrid vehicles. Secondly, the mining and processing of metals used in the batteries have a major environmental and processing footprint, as does the manufacturing process. Cutting down on the need for virgin materials will impact the price of EVs and in the quest to limit global warming. “With rapid expansion in the battery supply chain, we have created a situation of high waste,” Max Reid from Wood Mackenzie, a market analysis firm, said at the Advanced Automotive Battery Conference in Germany in mid-June 2022. “Recycling can reduce rapid expansion in carbon-intensive mines as well as reduce waste. Together, recycling production scrap and end-of-life batteries could become a substantial source of raw material to meet surging demand. Recycling also presents an opportunity to source materials in regions which lack natural resources,” he added. Graeme Cooper, of the UK’s transmission system operator National Grid, believes the recycling of batteries is inevitable. “It makes neither economic nor environmental sense for EV batteries to be dumped in landfill—it just won’t happen.” GROWING DEMAND The issue of a mountain of EV battery waste is looming. Only ten million electric cars were on the world’s roads at the end of 2020. But by 2030, the EV stock will reach 145 million in 2030, or 7% of the road vehicle fleet, says the International Energy Association (IEA). “Serious recycling needs to start now, not in 2040,” says Paul Anderson, a professor at the University of Birmingham in the UK. “We need to develop the industry very quickly.” With the rising demand for EVs, it is predicted that batteries will be in short supply by 2024-2025 as will the raw materials for the vehicles by 2027-2028, according to the CEO of Stellantis, Carlos Tavares, in May 2022. Stellantis is the world’s fourth largest car-maker and owns brands such as Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, Citroën, Dodge and Fiat. Yet the re-use or recycling of EV batteries has had little time to develop since the early low-carbon vehicles such as the Nissan Leaf and Chevy Bolt were launched in 2010. New battery packs typically retain their charging-discharging capacity for up to 320,000 kilometres. SECOND LIFE Some old EV batteries are finding a new lease of life, although this sector is in its infancy. Nissan, a Japanese car-maker, is reusing old EV batteries in so-called automated guided vehicles—robots—that deliver parts within its car factories. Elsewhere, former Nissan batteries are also being used to provide backup power to the Amsterdam Arena, an entertainment and sporting complex in the Netherlands. California is home to an eight megawatt-hour (MWh) storage system made of old car batteries, which is connected to a solar photovoltaic project. The facility was expected to reach 17 MWh by Q2 of 2022 by adding further retired batteries, says B2U Storage Solutions, the project owner. In 2020, the UK arm of German carmaker BMW launched a new battery re-use partnership with Off Grid Energy, an energy-storage company. The venture is allowing used batteries from electric Minis to have a second, repurposed life as mobile power and fast-charging units for events. COMPLICATED TECHNOLOGY Despite these initiatives, the reuse of batteries in EVs or repurposing them for stationary storage is complicated. Lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries—today’s dominant technology—degrade due to age, the number of cycles, depth of cycling and temperature, notes Madeline Tyson, from the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI), a US-based non-profit organisation. This impacts not only the quality of the battery while in use in the original car, but how easily it can be repurposed for use in other vehicles that use batteries less heavily or other storage solutions that provide grid balancing services or store energy from rooftop solar panels. Today’s fast-charging for EVs, of the sort typically found along motorways, can shorten the life of many batteries. Commercial fast-charging stations subject electric car batteries to high temperatures and high resistance that can cause them to crack, leak, and lose storage capacity, according to researchers at the University of California. Batteries that are regularly charged via fast-charging units may be less valuable at their end of life. Elsewhere, warranty issues complicate the reuse of some batteries. Most cells are made for a specific use—any warranties would be void if they are used for other applications—and are limited by time, says RMI’s Tyson. EV batteries in BMW and Mini cars batteries have a warranty of 160,000 kilometres or eight years, for instance. Tyson says that companies need the right incentives to track how batteries degrade while in the car so the rest of the battery ecosystem can decide if and where it can be used again. MAXIMISE OUTPUT In theory, EV batteries can be reused in stationary grid applications or as storage in buildings long after their mobile use has ended, allowing the costly act of recycling to be delayed. Even if they hold less charge than a new battery, a larger quantity of low-cost, used batteries could be assembled in a building where the volume is not so important, says David Reichmuth at the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), a Massachusetts-based NGO. Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) found that brand new EV batteries installed at a 2.5 MW solar farm in California would not provide enough of a return on investment, but installing used EV batteries could be profitable providing the batteries cost less than 60% of their original price. Batteries that have declined to 80% of their original capacity are no longer of use in EVs but could be used as stationary storage until their capacity had fallen to 70% of their rated capacity. DEAD BATTERIES Batteries should be designed specifically to be reused or recycled, stresses Anderson at the University of Birmingham. “Some car companies are discussing this, but they are under such pressure from government targets to get vehicles on the road,” he says. “What is being said, planned and thought of, is a bit less than the scale of the issue merits.” Ultimately, even repurposed batteries should be recycled. All major carmakers are looking into recycling, notes Andy Miller of Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, a market analysis firm, which provides data and intelligence for the Li-ion battery EV supply chain. Policy can help. Most Li-ion battery recycling—including consumer goods such as phones and laptops—is in Asia. China, the main controller of the value chain, does have regulations that cover many aspects of Li-ion battery manufacture and recycling. Japan also regulates battery recycling—new vehicle manufacturers are responsible for batteries and must maintain knowledge of battery recycling technology that is then incorporated into recycling. REGULATORY CHANGES Meanwhile, in Europe, the Union’s proposed Batteries Regulation would require rechargeable batteries—including those for EVs—to use responsibly sourced materials, with restricted use of hazardous substances and minimum content of recycled materials. It would also require disclosure and labelling of the battery’s carbon footprint, performance and durability. The European Commission is also proposing that only rechargeable EV and industrial batteries with a carbon footprint declaration can be sold in the EU. The regulation would also require the formation of “battery passports” that inform consumers of a battery’s contents, the origin of the materials and their environmental impacts so that reuse and recycling can be monitored.
Given that the recycling market has yet to gain traction, it inevitably lags the EV markets by several years. “End-of-life batteries will emerge as a meaningful source of recycling feedstock around 2030 and from then the scrap pool will grow significantly in volume, overwhelmingly due to the influx of batteries beginning to reach their end-of-life in the 2030s,” says Sarah Colbourn, also from Benchmark Mineral Intelligence. The technology needed to pull apart Li-ion batteries and turn them back into battery-grade materials efficiently has not developed, says Benchmark’s Miller. In the future, the chemical make-up of EV batteries may be very different, easing the task of recycling. But for the next five years at least, Li-ion is expected to remain the standard, UCS’s Reichmuth adds. RECYCLING METHODS There are three major methods used to recycle used Li-ion batteries: pyrometallurgical, hydrometallurgical and direct recycling. The pyrometallurgical method uses heat and “reductants” to reduce battery components to metals and slag, before separating them. Pyrometallurgy recovers fewer usable materials. Hydrometallurgical methods use aqueous solutions to extract metal compounds followed by selective precipitation—using a reagent that precipitates one or more of the metals, leaving others in the solution—to recover each one. To facilitate more efficient material recovery, with direct recycling batteries are disassembled and the battery components physically separated. This is a labour-intensive, dangerous task and it cannot yet be automated. Western economies are shying away this process because of safety concerns, says Anderson. The environmental emissions vary by recycling process, with hydrometallurgical and direct recycling resulting in lower CO2-equivalent emissions than pyrometallurgical recycling mainly because of the lower energy intensity, according to the California Environmental Protection Agency. Yet not all of the ingredients of an EV battery are worth recycling, in financial terms, such as the polymers, says Anderson. Governments need to address this and develop a more circular style of battery economy, he says. Recycling is, however, gaining momentum within the battery sector, particularly with automakers. Former Tesla executive JB Straubel’s new startup is partnering with Ford to eventually recycle EV batteries; Belgium-based materials technology company Umicore is developing a site to process 7000 tonnes of Li-ion batteries annually and is partnering with German car firm Audi; Volkswagen Group opened a recycling site in Germany in 2021; while Tesla itself is reportedly recycling batteries in China. CIRCLE OF LIFE The International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT), an independent non-profit US organisation that advises environmental regulators, says battery recycling could have a profound impact long-term on the environment.
Recycling could reduce the need for new material mining by 20% in 2040 and 40% in 2050, it says. Once recycling processes are established, the cumulative use of lithium and nickel in EV batteries—with the Li-ion battery architecture that is standard today—could be cut by approximately 25%. Prices of battery-grade lithium carbonate per tonne have escalated from $8000 in 2020 to $75,000 this year, according to the US Geological Survey. The ICCT says that cross-industry collaboration, public-private partnerships and regulatory and incentive measures are required to ensure batteries are designed not just for performance and price but also to be easily recyclable, then they must be collected upon end-of-use and recycled. Government regulations for battery recycling would optimally focus first on the materials with the highest value, such as those in the cathode, and with the greatest supply chain risk, says ICCT. Recycling should be ramped up in parallel with EV battery companies adopting new designs of batteries that use materials which are cheaper in plentiful supply, and not geopolitically risky or environmentally hazardous. The EV revolution is profoundly disruptive but so far, it has been motivated too much by profits. “We need to find ways of bringing in issues such as sustainability,” Anderson says. “We can’t just market-ise.” •
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Ros Davidson