Battery recycling could ease mining difficulties

Redwood Materials is storing batteries gathered from laptops, electric vehicles, toothbrushes, and other lithium-ion devices in piles and boxes across thirty acres of high desert. These batteries are waiting to be recycled at the biggest facility within the country.

Recycling results in less virgin material being extracted, which is essential as currently 180,000 metric tons of lithium are extracted by the world each year. Demand is predicted to reach ten times this amount by 2050 due to the rise in battery storage, electric vehicles, and other technology, which is required for the green transition. Known reserves may only last for the next fifteen years, which raises the need to increase recycling opportunities and rates.

JB Straubel founded Redwood in 2017, after his recycling career began when he was working at Tesla as the chief technology officer. Now Redwood is involved with a variety of automakers, such as BMW, Volkswagen, and BMW in order to collect EV batteries, plus Redwood also collects batteries from salvage yards, automotive repair shops and other similar companies.

It is clear that making policy tweaks has the potential to help recyclers acquire more, as do other adjustments, such as more clearly delineating when different entities throughout the supply chain are responsible for recovering, reusing, or recycling batteries. This could be a battery supplier, an auto manufacturer, a dismantler, or a refurbisher.

In 2024, Redwood stated that it ‘recycled 20 gigawatt-hours of lithium-ion batteries, or the equivalent of about a quarter-million EVs, generating $200 million in revenue.’ The company is also looking for expansion opportunities.

Redwood says ‘it processes about three-quarters of all lithium-ion batteries recycled in the United States. It is among a growing number of operations that shred the packs that power modern life into what is called “black mass,” then recoup upwards of 95 percent of the lithium, cobalt, nickel, and other minerals they contain.’

Beatrice Browning, an expert on battery recycling at Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, said that, ‘Before hitting these theoretical limits, though, demand for the metals is likely to outstrip the world’s ability to economically and ethically mine them.’

Browning added, “Recycling is going to plug that gap.”