Guilty as charged? Cooperation and alignment in automotive can power better EV battery recycling

Standardisation of EV battery design is a crucial step to be taken if the automotive industry is to bolster its green credentials when it comes to recycling.

That was one of many fascinating takeaways from a powerful discussion entitled “Maintaining Circularity in the EV Battery Ecosystem” at the recent FT Future of the Car conference.

The panel, including Cox Automotive‘s Martin Forbes, BMW’s Irene Feige and Glencore’s Kunal Sinha, spoke of progress being made to make the lifecycle of EV batteries more ‘circular’.

In simple terms, circularity or the circular economy is about retaining the lifespan of assets through repair, reuse and recycling. And as the battery is by far the most valuable asset in an electric vehicle, it is simply common sense that such an asset is squeezed or ‘sweated’ for all its worth.

Speaking following news that Glencore is set to build Europe’s biggest battery recycling plant in Italy, Sinha said there is huge room for growth in battery recycling. He insisted that the most significant aspect of the battery recycling story [JM1] would be the growth in the number and activity of gigafactories i.e., facilities that produce EV batteries on a large scale.

“The big wave coming is the gigafactory and the manufacturing scrap produced there”, Glencore’s Head of Global Recycling Sinha said. “That’s going to ramp up and will be quite inefficient to begin with – but then it will stabilise.”

Sinha characterised the end-of-life recycling of batteries as the Holy Grail, underlining the fact that reuse and repurposing was perhaps the biggest question that OEMs must answer.

Cox Automotive’s President Martin Forbes echoed this.

He said: “Globally, just 5% of lithium-ion batteries are being recycled. That has a major economic and environmental impact. We’re talking maybe about 8 million tonnes of waste.

 “We cannot let that happen to our industry; recycling has to be a core consideration.”

“Batteries are an asset”, he added. “We have to manage that battery as an asset. You look at the serviceability of the battery first. And you must look at the design. The industry’s not being helped by the fact you’ve got different manufacturers designing batteries in different formats.”

Standardisation is needed, Forbes concluded. Battery makers, OEMs and governments can make circularity easier that way.

“You have to design for circularity if circularity’s what you want”, Sinha responded, echoing Forbes’ point. “For reuse, repurposing and, indeed, manufacturing, if the end goal is a second life, that must be a design objective[JM2] .”

BMW’s Head of Climate Strategy and Circular Economy Irene Feige said: “I think until the mid-2030s we will see production scrap being the major part and end-of-life will continue to increase slowly.”

The panel discussed how metals used in battery production are in short supply and how much more needs to be done across the globe to improve the collection of used cells for recycling.

Feige said: “We are seeing a lot see a lot of investment in recycling facilities and cell chemistry in the US also due to the (Inflation Reduction Act) IRA. We are wondering what is going to happen here in Europe, what's going to be the answer to the IRA here is important.

“And when it comes to export of black mass ... the question is what's going to happen in Europe. As a resource-short region, I think it's important that we take care that the materials really stay in Europe.”

One positive, according to Sinha, is that EV assets will be easier, in the future, to track and manage because they are more ‘connected’ than ICE vehicles.

He added: “ICE vehicles are currently being reprocessed on a huge scale. Businesses involved in this will have to be reimagined for EVs and collection networks will have to become a little more sophisticated.”

Forbes said OEMs should focus somewhat on bringing used EVs back into their ecosystem as many such vehicles end up, towards the end of their life, in far-flung corners of the world. He argues the batteries are too valuable for them to be ‘lost’ in this way.

Asked by panel moderator and Financial Times journalist Harry Dempsey whether the future battery recycling landscape would have an ‘in-house’ or ‘partnering’ demeanour, the panel consensus was that the multiple forces at play made predictions difficult.

Sinha was adamant that who does the recycling isn’t as important as ensuring materials are extracted and are of battery grade for their ‘next life’ usage.

Forbes said: “At one of our big battery centres, I’ve seen how we strip down the battery pack, take every single piece of plastic and sort it for recycling. The same goes for the metal, wiring and electronics.

“The remaining pack of cells is put through a shredder. From that we extract the plastic, copper and aluminium before it’s refined and handed over as black mass. So, at least 95% of that battery pack can be recycled in some shape or form.”

Forbes gave a wry smile when an audience member at the talk asked if OEMs should be forced to share their battery health state data so that end-of-life batteries could be collected more easily.

He revealed that more information would be forthcoming from OEMs about battery degradation.

BMW’s Feige said EV batteries were holding life much longer than was previously the case.

The discussion concluded with the consensus that shortening the automotive supply chain could help with maintaining or adding to, circularity in the EV battery ecosystem. However, Feige was adamant that it was more a question of greater cooperation in terms of recycling cells.

Forbes finished by highlighting the growing demand for repurposed battery packs, pointing to their use in Ajax’s Johan Cruyff Arena as an emergency power source and as a power source for construction projects – two examples that underline the urgency and relevance of circularity.