Dead EV batteries turn to gold with US incentives

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Last edited Sun Jul 23, 2023, 09:24 AM - Edit history (1)

The story, from Reuters, starts off in England, because ... Reuters.

Charged

Dead EV batteries turn to gold with US incentives

By Nick Carey, Paul Lienert and Victoria Waldersee
July 21, 2023 3:49 PM EDT • Updated 2 days ago



[1/5] Marc Trent, CEO of vehicle dismantler company Charles Trent Ltd, opens up a specially-built, fire-safe container for batteries salvaged from written-off electric vehicles and hybrids in Poole, Britain, June 7, 2023. REUTERS/Nick Carey



[5/5] A worker at the vehicle dismantler company Charles Trent Ltd unbolts an engine from an old vehicle for reuse or recycling, on a disassembly line in Poole, Britain, June 7, 2023. REUTERS/Nick Carey

POOLE, England, July 21 (Reuters) - A little-publicized clause in the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act has companies scrambling to recycle electric vehicle batteries in North America, putting the region at the forefront of a global race to undermine China's dominance of the field.

The IRA includes a clause that automatically qualifies EV battery materials recycled in the U.S. as American-made for subsidies, regardless of their origin. That is important because it qualifies automakers using U.S.-recycled battery materials for EV production incentives.

Reuters interviewed more than a dozen industry officials and experts who say that is kicking off a U.S. factory building boom, encouraging automakers to research more recyclable batteries, and could eventually make it harder for buyers in developing countries to buy old used EVs.

China handles virtually all EV battery recycling in a global market projected to grow from $11 billion in 2022 to $18 billion by 2028, according to research firm EMR. As more EVs are introduced and age out of the vehicle fleet, that business will grow.

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Same thing, from CNBC:

AUTOS

Dead EV batteries turn to gold with U.S. incentives

PUBLISHED FRI, JUL 21 2023 • 2:16 PM EDT

Reuters



Pallets of depleted lithium-ion batteries at JB Straubel’s Redwood Materials are ready for recycling.
Source: CNBC

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JB Straubel, CEO of Redwood Materials, which was awarded a $2 billion U.S. government loan in February to build out a battery material recycling and remanufacturing complex in Nevada, said the IRA treats recycled battery materials as locally “urban mined,” or materials recovered from scrap rather than obtained from mining.

That has encouraged U.S. companies to move faster on recycling efforts than their counterparts in the European Union, which has focused instead on mandates, including minimum amounts of recycled materials in future EV batteries.

Recycling firms Ascend Elements, Li-Cycle and others are planning European plants in the next few years, but access to funding and the made-in-America incentive means several U.S. plants are already being built.

“What it (the IRA) does is change the demand equation for battery materials,” said Mike O’Kronley, CEO of Ascend Elements, which already has one recycling plant open in Georgia and has received nearly $500 million in Energy Department grants under the infrastructure law for a plant in Kentucky slated to open in late 2023. “We need to keep those valuable materials... so we can put them right back into EVs.”

{snip}

Redwood Materials is in Carson City, Nevada.