The Electric Vehicle Battery Recycling Mismatchs

Electric vehicle (EV) batteries power the energy transition, but they do not last forever.Once capacity falls below 80%, they are retired from vehicles and must enter the recycling chain of collected, transported, and processed [1].By 2030, China alone is expected to retire 16.7-19.9million tons of traction batteries, enough to fill more than 600,000 shipping containers [2].These batteries contain valuable lithium, cobalt, and nickel, resources for which China imports more than 85%, 95%, and 90% of its supply, respectively [3].Yet only about 40% of retired batteries currently enter licensed recycling channels [4].The remainder is handled by informal operators.These crude acid leaching and open burning can generate emissions several times higher than those from certified facilities [5,6].