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I’m intrigued by the recycling process of lithium. You need to take batteries to special drop off locations to have them recycled, no? I wonder if there will be

I’m intrigued by the recycling process of lithium. You need to take batteries to special drop off locations to have them recycled, no? I wonder if there will be a financial incentive that coexists with device design policies to make this process easier to execute for the lazy consumer. Would be nice if my phone battery had a built-in $20.00 deposit (this is my opinion of course).

jillesvangurp 4y ago
Lithium is a very valuable commodity and it is present in extremely dense quantities in used up batteries. It's probably cheaper to recycle it than to extract it from very low concentration brines or deposits in nature. Recycling is not a problem but a huge business opportunity; which is why there are a lot of very big investments in this space happening. There are going to be a massive amount of used up batteries in a few decades full of valuable materials that can be extracted and sold at a profit. Anyone that can figure out how to recycle them cost effectively will be making a lot of profit. Seriously, nobody is going to dump EV batteries in a landfill; that would be extremely stupid (and illegal in most civilized places). And if people somehow did this anyway, companies would popup to mine those landfills. Because why would you leave batteries in the ground that are contain tens/hundreds of dollars worth of raw materials? That's not going to be a thing. A dead EV battery is actually worth more than most second/third hand ICE cars changing hands for a few hundred/thousand dollars. And those are recycled as well eventually. Including their lead acid batteries which in comparison are almost worthless. Just look up the kilo price of lithium. It's around 70$ currently. Lead is worth a bit under 2$/kg. Yet lead battery recycling is very successful. Scrap pricing for lead batteries is around 50 cents per kilo and recycling them is a profitable business. A Tesla has around 12kg of lithium as well as few other valuable materials (depending on the model). So, the raw materials in a dead Tesla battery is worth at least 840$ (just the lithium). So when it dies, you don't trash it but you sell it to the highest bidder. Even if that price comes down a bit eventually, it's still going to be lucrative. There is not going to be a shortage of demand for lithium for the foreseeable future. It's a growth market that will keep on growing for a few decades.
- comfypotato 4y ago
  Fascinating. Thanks for the informative reply. I extend my wonderings to "where is consumer lithium"? My surface-level dive makes it seem like an individual might have a maximum of 500 grams of lithium outside of their EV. Seems like EVs will be above and beyond the highest concentration of lithium to the point that we need not worry too much about other sources (at least not until the EV recycling system is thoroughly settled.)
- lm28469 4y ago
  > Seriously, nobody is going to dump EV batteries in a landfill; that would be extremely stupid (and illegal in most civilized places). I mean we ship our old electronics to Africa where they burn them in open air dumps to retrieve the metal, it wouldn't be the first time we're being lied to about "recycling"

jillesvangurp 4y ago

Lithium is a very valuable commodity and it is present in extremely dense quantities in used up batteries. It's probably cheaper to recycle it than to extract it from very low concentration brines or deposits in nature. Recycling is not a problem but a huge business opportunity; which is why there are a lot of very big investments in this space happening. There are going to be a massive amount of used up batteries in a few decades full of valuable materials that can be extracted and sold at a profit. Anyone that can figure out how to recycle them cost effectively will be making a lot of profit. Seriously, nobody is going to dump EV batteries in a landfill; that would be extremely stupid (and illegal in most civilized places). And if people somehow did this anyway, companies would popup to mine those landfills. Because why would you leave batteries in the ground that are contain tens/hundreds of dollars worth of raw materials? That's not going to be a thing. A dead EV battery is actually worth more than most second/third hand ICE cars changing hands for a few hundred/thousand dollars. And those are recycled as well eventually. Including their lead acid batteries which in comparison are almost worthless. Just look up the kilo price of lithium. It's around 70$ currently. Lead is worth a bit under 2$/kg. Yet lead battery recycling is very successful. Scrap pricing for lead batteries is around 50 cents per kilo and recycling them is a profitable business. A Tesla has around 12kg of lithium as well as few other valuable materials (depending on the model). So, the raw materials in a dead Tesla battery is worth at least 840$ (just the lithium). So when it dies, you don't trash it but you sell it to the highest bidder. Even if that price comes down a bit eventually, it's still going to be lucrative. There is not going to be a shortage of demand for lithium for the foreseeable future. It's a growth market that will keep on growing for a few decades.

comfypotato 4y ago
Fascinating. Thanks for the informative reply. I extend my wonderings to "where is consumer lithium"? My surface-level dive makes it seem like an individual might have a maximum of 500 grams of lithium outside of their EV. Seems like EVs will be above and beyond the highest concentration of lithium to the point that we need not worry too much about other sources (at least not until the EV recycling system is thoroughly settled.)
lm28469 4y ago
> Seriously, nobody is going to dump EV batteries in a landfill; that would be extremely stupid (and illegal in most civilized places). I mean we ship our old electronics to Africa where they burn them in open air dumps to retrieve the metal, it wouldn't be the first time we're being lied to about "recycling"