Author name: Gerrit Bockey

Librec is establishing Switzerland’s first major electric vehicle battery recycling plant in Biberist. A new hall has been constructed on the site of a former paper factory. Starting in late October, Librec plans to recycle 12,000 tons of EV batteries annually at the Biberist facility. As the number of electric vehicles increases, so does the demand for recycling solutions for EV batteries, especially since the extraction of metals needed for batteries often involves challenging working conditions. Battery recycling offers the opportunity to produce new EV batteries using recycled materials, helping to mitigate some of these issues. Librec is about to open the largest recycling facility for electric vehicle batteries in Switzerland. The new recycling hall has been built on the site of a former paper factory in Biberist (Canton Solothurn). The facility is expected to start operations at the end of October. Upon delivery, the batteries will first be discharged on-site. “The battery is opened, connected to discharging equipment, and all remaining energy is extracted,” explained Jodok Reinhardt, founder and CEO of Librec, in an interview with SRF. The energy recovered will be used to cover one-third of the recycling facility’s energy needs. Source: https://www.srf.ch/news/schweiz/biberist-so-schweizer-fabrik-bereit-bald-werden-e-auto-batterien-recycelt

The German chemical company BASF has temporarily halted its planned battery recycling project at the Tarragona site in Spain. The company cites delays in expanding battery factories in Europe as the main reason. In its second quarter 2024 financial report, BASF announced that the large-scale metal refinery project at the Tarragona site will be paused. BASF is prepared to resume the project once the development of cell capacities and the adoption of electric vehicles in Europe pick up again. In July 2023, it became known that BASF was planning a recycling plant for battery materials in Tarragona. At that time, the European Commission had announced funding of 3.6 billion euros for 41 clean-tech projects, including BASF’s new battery recycling facility. The company planned to achieve high lithium recovery rates with the new technology. Currently, electric vehicle batteries last longer than initially predicted, resulting in a lower volume of end-of-life batteries available for recycling. Existing recycling plants mainly process production scraps from cell factories. Due to delays in expanding some cell factories and companies like Volkswagen’s subsidiary PowerCo building fewer capacities than planned, there is less material available for recycling facilities. Source: https://www.n-tv.de/wirtschaft/BASF-legt-Batterierecyclingprojekt-in-Spanien-auf-Eis-article25118239.html

Norwegian company Hydrovolt, a joint venture between Norsk Hydro and Northvolt, is planning to build a recycling plant in Hordain in northern France.