Two major battery and recycling companies are collaborating in hopes of providing European automakers with locally sourced vital metals for their battery-electric vehicles.
Global battery materials producer and recycler BASF and battery recycler Stena Recycling have entered into a black mass purchase agreement. This agreement is part of a broader collaboration between the companies setting up a battery recycling ecosystem for the continent’s BEV market.
Black mass is produced by mechanical treatment of end-of-life lithium-ion batteries and battery production scrap. This cooperation focuses on improving black mass production processes to achieve better recovery rates for critical metals such as lithium, nickel, cobalt and manganese for reuse in new BEVs. After collection and mechanical dismantling of battery packs, the valuable metals can be chemically recovered.
The first steps are handled by Stena Recycling’s facility in Halmstad, Sweden, before the black mass is further processed in BASF’s prototype metal refinery at Schwarzheide, Germany. The companies aim to transfer such a model into BASF’s planned commercial-scale battery recycling metal refinery at a location yet to be settled on in Europe.
Daniel Schönfelder, president of BASF’s catalysts division, says: “By entering into a co-operation with Stena Recycling, we are strengthening BASF’s ability to offer a broadened battery collection network with a strong partner in the Scandinavian countries so that we can expand our offer for individual and closed-loop solutions to battery producers and electric vehicle manufacturers in Europe. This is an important step towards a circular economy for the European electric vehicle battery market.”
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