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Lithium batteries don't use up lithium. After its lifespan, the lithium is still there, so the battery will (hopefully) be sent to a recycling facility where t
by yongjik 5y ago
Lithium batteries don't use up lithium. After its lifespan, the lithium is still there, so the battery will (hopefully) be sent to a recycling facility where the lithium is recovered and used to build a new battery.
In that sense lithium is totally unlike oil.
- jazzyjackson 5y agoIt was only recently I learned that “recyclable” meant “theoretically can be recycled”, not that there’s an existing process or, more importantly, economy. Apparently there isn’t much incentive to extract metals from batteries as is - I don’t know how costs compare to extracting from spent batteries vs ore, but only 3-5% of Lithium batteries are currently recycled (for the nickel and cobalt more than the lithium), the rest, presumably, is landfilled. so it may surprise others that recycling electric car batteries is still an active research area: https://cen.acs.org/materials/energy-storage/time-serious-recycling-lithium/97/i28 https://cen.acs.org/materials/energy-storage/time-serious-re...
- _hypx 5y agoAlongside lithium, the same is true of any plastic materials and most of the electrolytes. Ironically, the rapidly reduction in battery costs is make this problem harder, as there are fewer high-value components worth recycling.