Fortum, BASF, and Nornickel have signed a letter of intent to plan a battery recycling cluster in Harjavalta, Finland, serving the electric vehicle market. This would enable a successful “closed loop” cycle to re-use the critical metals present in used batteries.
Using metals from recycled batteries to produce battery materials offers significant CO2 reduction in the production of electric vehicles. Additional CO2 reduction can be achieved by using electricity from renewable sources in Finland for the recycling process.
“By recycling valuable metals in lithium-ion batteries we reduce the environmental impact of electric car batteries by complementing the supply of cobalt, nickel and other critical metals from primary sources. Through our previous acquisition of a Finnish growth company Crisolteq, an expert in low CO2 hydrometallurgical processing, we are very proud that Fortum is now able to increase the recovery rate of valuable materials in lithium-ion batteries from 50% to over 80%”, said Tero Holländer, Head of Business Development, Fortum Recycling and Waste.
BASF intends to use recycled materials from the processes developed by the companies within this cooperation in its planned battery materials precursor plant in Harjavalta, Finland.