creator: Eric Walz
A rendering of the Redwood Supplies electrical automobile battery recycling facility in South Carolina.
Electrical automobile battery recycling startup Redwood Supplies introduced its constructing a battery recycling facility in South Carolina. The power will help the area’s emergence as a rising EV and battery manufacturing hub.
Nevada-based Redwood Supplies plans to interrupt floor on its new 600-acre South Carolina Campus in Q1 2023 and have the primary recycling course of working by the tip of 2023. The plant will create greater than 1,500 new jobs.
Redwood Supplies combines recycling, refining and remanufacturing to supply and return battery supplies to U.S. battery cell producers. The corporate collects end-of-life batteries, and extracts helpful uncooked supplies reminiscent of nickel, copper, cobalt, and lithium. These recycled supplies are then used to fabricate cathode and anode merchandise that may go into new batteries.
Redwood says its EV battery recycling expertise can recuperate, on common, greater than 95% of the weather like nickel, cobalt, lithium and copper from a battery. As soon as recycled these supplies may be reused to supply anode copper foil and cathode active materials for future battery manufacturing.
Redwood’s new facility in South Carolina is a perfect location to serve the auto business. Automakers Hyundai Motor Co, Kia, Volvo, BMW and Mercedes Benz are investing billions to construct EV factories within the Southeast U.S., in addition to battery manufacturing amenities.
The area simply outdoors of Charleston, South Carolina is also known as the “Battery Belt.” Redwood estimates that a whole lot of GWh a yr ofbattery cell manufacturing capability will likely be operational within the area by 2030 to provide automakers.
Redwood goals to supply 100 GWh of cathode and anode parts a yr, which is sufficient to manufacture the batteries for over million EVs. The plant can be designed for future growth. Redwood says it doubtlessly can produce a number of hundred GWh of anode and cathode supplies to satisfy future demand.
Redwood Supplies was based in 2017 by J.B. Straubel, one of many co-founders of electrical automaker Tesla together with Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning. The three launched Tesla earlier than present Chief Govt Elon Musk, who was an early investor, joined the corporate.
Straubel served as Tesla’s first Chief Technical Officer and was the automaker’s fifth worker. He labored for Tesla till 2019, however launched Redwood Supplies in 2017 whereas nonetheless working for the electrical automaker.
Talking at a convention in Oct 2020, Straubel stated he needs to construct Redwood Supplies into “the world’s top battery recycling company.”
In 2019, Tesla’s battery accomplice Panasonic entered right into a partnership with Redwood Supplies to reclaim the scrap generated from battery cell manufacturing at Tesla’s gigafactory in Nevada. Presently all the scrap supplies left over from battery manufacturing is shipped to Redwood’s Nevada facility for recycling.
One of many targets of recycling of used EV battery supplies is to assist drive down the excessive value of manufacturing them. The excessive value of batteries is among the causes that almost all EVs value 1000’s of {dollars} greater than comparable gas-powered autos. Battery producers which are utilizing a gentle provide of recycled uncooked supplies also can assist tackle rising demand for batteries because the world’s automakers transition to constructing extra EVs.
Redwood believes that so as to make electrical autos sustainable and reasonably priced, pathways for the gathering, recycling and remanufacturing end-of-life battery packs into new battery supplies should be established.
Presently, many of the anode and cathode parts for EV batteries are produced abroad, predominantly from China and South Korea. Consequently, battery cell producers need to supply them through a 50,000+ mile international provide chain.
Redwood estimates that battery producers will spend greater than $150B on anode and cathode supplies produced abroad by 2030. This sends most 50 to 75% of the financial worth and job creation to outdoors of the U.S., based on Redwood. As a way to cut back the reliance of abroad suppliers, metals reminiscent of lithium and nickel will should be produced and refined domestically.
In March, Redwood Supplies announced the launch of a comprehensive battery recycling program in California to effectively and safely recycle end-of-life hybrid and electrical automobile battery packs. Automakers Ford Motor Co and Volvo Vehicles had been the primary automakers to straight help this system. Redwood Supplies says it should settle for all lithium-ion (Li-ion) and nickel metallic hydride (NiMH) batteries within the state and welcomes different automakers to affix in its recycling efforts in California.
Redwood Supplies additionally introduced a separate collaboration with Toyota in July for the recycling of EV batteries. The 2 firms plan to construct a whole closed loop ecosystem for the recycling batteries from Toyota’s future hybrid and fully-electric autos.
