Lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) will enable the transition from hydrocarbon fuels as a dense store of energy in vehicles, to storing clean electricity with no carbon emissions at the point of use. Their production is imperative to enable the decarbonisation of the transport sector. Whilst transportation will be one of the major consumer of LIBs, they will also find application in a wide range of other sectors.
There are a range of different LIB chemistries (Figure 1), each of which have different performance criteria which make them suited for different applications. All LIBs contain lithium (Li). Some of the different chemistries which offer higher performance - extended range and power - are more reliant on certain technology critical metals like cobalt (Co) and nickel (Ni).
Given how important batteries, and the technology critical metals they contain are to our economy, it is essential to ensure the good custody of these materials and ensure that they return to the economy at the end of life.
Disassembly
Designing battery packs for the full lifecycle, by enabling easy disassembly will enable a range of options including repair, remanufacture, reuse and recycling. If batteries can be disassembled, the technology metals they contain can be kept in higher value states and recycled more effectively. At the moment, many of the processes for recycling batteries involve putting them into a shredder. This reduces the variety of all the different types of battery pack to a uniform product that can easily be handled. Unfortunately, in mixing the material streams of technology metals with other contaminants means that subsequent recycling processes are more limited.
Legal and regulatory
As a result of policy shift to electric mobility, the number of EVs in use is continuously leading to a greater volume of lithium-ion batteries coupled with issues around capacity, transport, safety and waste shipment regulations. In order to address this challenge a set of policy and regulatory interventions are required:
- Developing clear regulation and policy on re-use and re-purposing, including the influencing of contractual and ownership models (e.g. battery leasing schemes) for EV batteries to facilitate recycling and second-use. This intervention will assist in developing appropriate business models that will promote re-use and safe and effective life-management of EV batteries. An important precondition is developing clear legal definitions of what "re-use", "repurposing" and "recycling" entail which should be done with a wider endeavour to revisit the definition of waste under the Waste Framework Directive.
- Developing extended producer responsibility (EPR) regulations that support a move to a circular economy model, ensuring safe and effective re-use of EV batteries, with increasingly robust recycling targets. This regulatory intervention will assist in increasing the recycling and recovery of material within EV batteries.
- Developing eco-design criteria for recycling and remanufacturing, including restrictions on the use of hazardous substances and promotion of designs that allow easy separation of parts. This regulatory intervention will facilitate dismantling and component separation leading to greater economic viability of recycling.
- Introducing mandatory chemistry labelling requirements for LIBs to enable end-of-life batteries to be easily and safely sorted and separated for recycling in specific groups. Currently there is no legal requirement to label the cathode chemistry on a battery pack which is coupled with a variety of different technologies on the market. This measure will facilitate separation of batteries at the end of their life and recycling of batteries containing same or similar properties.