145 million electronic cars are projected to be on the road by 2030 and demand for lithium-ion batteries is expected to increase up to 14 times. This is despite the fact that countries and manufacturers are tending towards CNG cars.
As a general rule, electric car battery manufacturers provide an 8-year warranty on batteries. It is generally accepted that a battery is unusable when its efficiency drops below 70-80%, which, according to drivers’ experience, can happen even after 12 years, which corresponds to driving about 580,000 kilometers.
Scientists say the chemicals used to make electric car batteries are toxic, so when released into the environment they can have negative effects on living organisms, including humans.
For example, cadmium causes kidney damage and anemia, cobalt disrupts thyroid function, while lithium is deposited in the lungs, leading to swelling.
This has raised concerns as to the dangers of irresponsible disposal of car batteries and the need to properly manage them.
The depletion of rare earth resources needed for battery production, as well as the CO2 emissions produced during their multi-stage processing, are also a source of concern.
Some of these problems may be solved by properly recycling lithium-ion batteries. It involves reusing them as energy storage, as well as recovering materials and valuable raw materials at the end of their life.
The amount of raw material recovered in the process of recycling batteries depends on their design and available technologies. Reports say scientists are still working on such methods for recycling lithium-ion batteries that will yield the best possible results.
When this is done, they can gain a second life as energy storage in other manufacturing processes or become a source of power for less demanding devices, such as a scooter or electric bicycle. Some companies collect used batteries, which can serve for about 10 more years as energy storage before they need to be recycled.
As batteries vary in construction, disassembly is done manually by skilled people in protective clothing, as potential mistakes in disassembling the cells could result in ignition or explosion. The most expensive and labor-intensive step in battery recycling is the extraction of valuable materials such as lithium, cobalt, nickel and manganese.
The degree of difficulty, and thus the profitability of recovery, depends on the type of battery.
This eliminates any waste or risk of potentially hazardous substances entering the environment.