An initiative to improve battery recycling has been set up by the EU

BeyondBattRec is a brand new EU project which was able to bring twelve partners together, to collectively work on innovative battery recycling technologies. Leading the project is the Aalborg University.

The overall aim of this innovative new project is to effectively and efficiently recover 95% of critical metals. These metals include cobalt, nickel and copper. Furthermore, this project will also focus on other aims such as the scalability of industrial applications.

It was at the end of 2024 when the project was launched and it has already been agreed that the project will operate for four years, meaning it will finish by the end of 2028.

Whilst the main focus for this project will be to recover materials, the other aim of this project will be to reuse more than 70% of the battery weight, whilst also working to reduce CO2 emissions by 50% and finally, recover 95% of non-metallic parts.

A key part of this project will involve the parties focusing on creating new processes for sorting, deactivating and finally recovering battery materials. The new processes which require attention also include the activities the partners want to complete and one of these things is to test the reuse of recycled materials which are found within new battery cells. These materials have the potential to contribute to the creation of a recycling system which has been fully optimised.

It has been revealed that BeyondBattRec has received 7.45 million euros in funding through being part of the Horizon Europe program. The twelve partners involved with this project are, Aalborg University, Varta Microbattery, Siemens, Accurec Recycling, Andaltec, UVR-FIA, Shift Materials, University of Jaén, EurA AG, Coventry University, ACIB and Tes AMM.

BeyondRec stated that, ‘recycling rates for batteries only lie at 12 per cent globally and, in Europe, there has been a fourfold increase in battery scrap. Europe is currently dependent on imports for bauxite, cobalt, lithium and natural graphite (87, 86, 100, and 98 per cent, respectively), all critical for lithium-ion batteries.’

Recent information from Benchmark Minerals, showed that, ‘the flow of black mass – the material extracted from scrap for recycling – currently almost exclusively flows through Asia, meaning that battery materials brought to Europe are lost again because of a lack of mature recycling industries.’

Aalborg University is a consortium leader and they spoke about the project supporting, ‘the political requirements of the European Green Deal and the visions and objectives of the BATT4EU partnership “contributing to the development of competitive, sustainable and circular European battery value chain through implementation of best available technologies in battery recycling.”’