How Recycling Can Help Reduce Battery Costs and Foreign Dependence?

As renewable energy sources progress, batteries, particularly lithium-ion batteries, are also booming—batteries power electric vehicles, portable electronics, and renewable energy sources, which are the fastest-growing innovations.

However, while these advancements come with multiple benefits, like the use of environmentally friendly renewable energy sources, lower grid dependency, and lower bills, they also highlight various challenges, including the increasing cost of battery components, the environmental effects of waste disposal and mining, and rising dependency on foreign sources. 

The best solution to such challenges is battery recycling. Battery recycling is a beneficial process that helps reduce battery costs and minimize foreign dependency. Reusing useful battery materials in the manufacturing process also boosts energy security and decreases environmental impacts. In this article, we'll discover how recycling can help reduce battery costs and foreign dependency. 

Increasing Cost of Battery Materials

Batteries have seen tremendous changes over the past decades. In 2015, due to an instant boost in the EV market and rising demand for renewable energy storage solutions, battery prices began to soar. In 2017, the prices tripled because of the fastest expansion of China's EV market and increased lithium production and mining investment. 

One factor driving the increasing prices of battery material is the supply of cobalt, which was sourced from the Democratic Republic of Congo. Its supply comforts price volatility due to unstable geopolitical conditions. 

Furthermore, the current explosive growth in lithium demand is also adding to the problem. The result is a market sector that's still growing through production and sourcing, with growing pains. Demand and manufacturing expenses put stress on both investors and consumers. 

So, to solve all such challenges, battery recycling is the most efficient solution for reusing expensive metals and reintroducing them into the manufacturing process. 

Reducing Costs via Battery Material Recycling

A battery recycling company reports that recycling battery material can decrease the cost of production by up to 30%. 

Recycling is vital in reducing costs as it can recover about 95% of material like nickel, lithium, or cobalt from spent batteries. It helps decrease foreign dependency on battery material and minimizes waste disposal. 

So various countries like Germany, the US, and China are deploying various kinds of battery material recycling methods mentioned below;

• Smelting 

In smelting recycling, spent batteries are fed into an extreme-hot furnace with no required pre-treatment. The raw materials in the battery burn to offer heat for further processing. Then, the most precious metals, like nickel, lithium, or cobalt, are reduced and recycled as a mixed alloy, which is further processed to re-treat separated metals for reintegration in any product. 

The economy of this process highly depends on precious metals like cobalt. This recycling process with lithium and nickel is profitably beneficial but not currently widely used. 

• Leaching

In this battery recovery method, batteries are shredded. The copper and aluminum metals are screened out for recycling, and the active material powder is treated with acid so that metal ions can be emitted from the cathode structure. It can then be separated by multiple solvent extractors and recovered as salts from sale. 

These salts can be deployed as organic materials for constructing new cathode materials. This recycling process is mostly used in China due to lower construction costs. It's the most effective recycling method, but it's still in the development stage.

Recycling methods reduce the precious metal content, which helps to minimize revenue and directly impacts overall battery costs. 

Reducing Foreign Dependency on Battery Materials

The Democratic Republic of Congo is responsible for 70% of global cobalt manufacturing, which involves illegal mining, armed conflicts, scary environmental practices, and human rights abuse, while lithium is mainly mined in developed countries like Australia and China. Battery recycling with decreased cobalt content could help minimize dependence on such challenging sources and raise a more secure supply chain. 

In January, the US Department of Energy launched DOE's first lithium-ion battery recycling R&D center. 

This center's motive is to make lithium-ion battery recycling profitable and competitive and to use recycling to assist in decreasing the US dependency on foreign sources for expansive metals like cobalt, lithium, and nickel. It launched with $15 million in investments and 50 researchers from six national universities and laboratories. 

Furthermore, other European countries like Germany are also taking required actions to decrease foreign dependence in the short term by bundling demands at a European level, using lower structured information of suppliers, and introducing government-initiated and coordinated build-up of lower reserves to ensure emergency supplies.

They are also looking for long-term plans by strongly promoting recycling. In Europe, Germany is the largest industrialized country that appropriately participates in battery recycling technology. This will not only decrease the geopolitical challenges but also allow the country to build a self-sufficient approach to battery manufacturing. 

Environmental Benefits of Battery Recycling

Batteries can also negatively impact the environment. Chinese Academy of Sciences reports that leakage of cobalt, nickel, and manganese from the casing of buried batteries to contaminate groundwater and soil threatens human health and the ecosystem. Lithium fluoride salts also have scary impacts on the environment deployed in the battery's electrolyte. 

So, the battery recycling process can reduce potential threats by controlling the quantity of material going to landfills. Less reliance on mining for battery materials also decreases the depletion of raw materials.

Further, purchase batteries from authentic suppliers that promote battery recycling and high-quality batteries to avoid chemical leakage during use. For this, Innotinum is the best! 

Take Professional Help to Recycle Batteries

In short, battery recycling is one of the most effective steps nations can take to reduce battery costs and foreign dependency and boost environmental sustainability. But it’s important to know that it’s extremely difficult and complicated and should be done under expert supervision. 

For this, Innotinum is vital as it knows how to accurately and carefully recycle the battery material and take measures to ensure environmental sustainability. 

Further, Innotinum offers a high-quality battery with zero chemical leakage during usage. So, place your order right now.