A Review on Battery Market Trends, Second-Life Reuse, and Recycling

Abstract

The rapid growth, demand, and production of batteries to meet various emerging applications, such as electric vehicles and energy storage systems, will result in waste and disposal problems in the next few years as these batteries reach end-of-life. Battery reuse and recycling are becoming urgent worldwide priorities to protect the environment and address the increasing need for critical metals. As a review article, this paper reveals the current global battery market and global battery waste status from which the main battery chemistry types and their management, including reuse and recycling status, are discussed. This review then presents details of the challenges, opportunities, and arguments on battery second-life and recycling. The recent research and industrial activities in the battery reuse domain are summarized to provide a landscape picture and valuable insight into battery reuse and recycling for industries, scientific research, and waste management.

Barriers to and uncertainties in understanding and quantifying global critical mineral and element supply

“…The slight increase in the Cd:Zn ratio post-2011 is coincident with annual increase in Te production (Figure 2B), likely a result of thin-film CdTe PV manufacturing. However, the future demand for Cd remains uncertain as its primary use is in the production of NiCd batteries, which are being phased out as a result of the negative environmental impact of Cd, with replacements by lithium-ion and nickel-metal hydride batteries (USGS, 2021) leading to a decrease in sales of NiCd batteries at a rate of 6% per year between 2002 and 2012 (Zhao et al, 2021). This may lead to a situation, where Cd could be stockpiled by smelters and refiners without a market for this metal, creating issues over safe storage and disposal rather than any issues over the security of supply of this metal.…”

“…The current short-term apparent improvement in Cd recovery could be the result of sold stockpiled Cd intermediates or added Cd supply from recycling end-of-life NiCd batteries to meet elevated demand for CdTe solar PV production, although this remains uncertain. Equally, the fact that NiCd batteries are being phased out (Zhao et al, 2021) barring specialty uses for these batteries means that this recycling source and demand for Cd is likely to further diminish over time.…”

A Mobile Energy Storage Unit Serving Multiple EV Charging Stations

“…According to the average speed assumed in Table 2 and the approximate energy consumption rate presented in [23], the traveling consumption is reflected in the SOC level reduction during the traveling time, as shown in Figure 9. The battery degradation cost of the MESS's battery is calculated considering a capital cost of energy capacity of $271/kWh, power conversion system cost of $288/kW (taken from [24]), an O&M cost of 0.03 cents/kWh [24], and a second-life battery selling price of $50/kWh [25]. This results in a charge/discharge cost of Finally, Figure 9 represents the state-of-charge (SOC) of the battery, noting that at the end of the day, 20% of the battery is maintained, which achieves the MDOD limit.…”

Novel Approach for Battery Type Determination: A Mere Electrical Alternative

“…Separating batteries according to their chemistry for use in second-life applications is a problem we face. Considering the environmental effects in addition to the limited reserves of the rare earth elements and lithium used in batteries; it is also a fact that batteries that have reached the end of their useful life will be added to the waste stream with other types of batteries that are currently collected for recycling 39 . Second-life battery capacity is projected to exceed 275 GWh per year by 2030 40 .…”

“…However, there are many technical, economic and regulatory challenges that can complicate this. In the recycling process and in the sale of recycled products, it is required to classify and separate batteries according to their chemical composition 39 . The difficulty in determining the chemistry of the battery is due to the lack of proper labelling, standard design or clear marking on the package 41 .…”