4 ms·
> Lithium is a valuable resource. EV batteries have lots of it. Therefore EV batteries are valuable even after they stop working. A Tesla battery weighs about
by rsj_hn 5y ago
> Lithium is a valuable resource. EV batteries have lots of it. Therefore EV batteries are valuable even after they stop working.
A Tesla battery weighs about 500 kg and has about 10kg of Lithium (2%). The Lithium is worth about $130, whereas the battery costs more than $10,000. It's difficult to extract the trace elements of lithium from the thousands of individual cells honeycombed together in the battery, so there is no known way of getting at that Lithium via processes that are even comparable to the value of the lithium recovered. That's why no one does it.
A car, on the other hand, is 55% steel by weight, and there are relatively straightforward ways of getting that steel (no, the car is not "melted down". The steel components are melted after they are removed from the car). That's why steel in cars is recycled but Lithium in batteries is not.
The issue with recycling is the cost of extraction -- yes, catalytic convertors and old computers contain trace elements like platinum (maybe $2 per catalytic convertor) but extracting it is far too expensive. So merely the presence of an expensive element in a manufactured good does not mean it is economic to extract the element. In the vast majority of situations, it's not.
- laurencerowe 5y ago> yes, catalytic convertors and old computers contain trace elements like platinum (maybe $2 per catalytic convertor) but extracting it is far too expensive. Catalytic converters can be worth $100s as scrap. They’re regularly stolen from parked cars.
- rsj_hn 5y agoRight, but not for the platinum, which is worth only about $2. Similarly, I'm not saying no that no one will find a way to get scrap value out of a used $10,000 battery, but it's not going to be for the $130 of lithium inside it.
- laurencerowe 5y agoI agree with you on the lithium - it is far too abundant. It seems that most of the value in a catalytic converter is in the palladium and rhodium, though the platinum is worth something too. Catalytic converter chemistries vary a lot too, with some omitting platinum and some omitting palladium. Globally, the catalytic converter industry uses about 112 tons or platinum, 170 tons of palladium, and 21 tons of rhodium per year. And an individual catalytic converter uses 1-2g for a small car up to 12-15g in a big truck. (Elsewhere I've seen 3-7g as an average for a US catalytic converter.) https://www.thermofisher.com/content/dam/tfs/ATG/CAD/CAD%20Documents/Application%20&%20Technical%20Notes/Portable%20Analyzers%20for%20Material%20ID/Handheld%20XRF/AutoCatalyticConverter-AppNote.pdf https://www.thermofisher.com/content/dam/tfs/ATG/CAD/CAD%20D... So from what I can tell, an average catalytic converter contains about 5g of PGM's which works out at: 1.85g of platinum at $40/g = $74 2.80g of palladium at $95/g = $361 0.35g of rhodium at $900/g = $315 The Washington post reports that catalytic converter thefts are largely driven by the rhodium they contain (the price of which has gone up enormously because it is a byproduct of platinum mining and platinum itself is not currently worth mining.) https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/africa/catalytic-converter-theft-south-africa-rhodium/2021/03/03/dc288192-777d-11eb-9489-8f7dacd51e75_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/africa/catalytic-conver...
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]