GM, LG Energy partner with Li-Cycle for on-site EV battery recycling

General Motors and LG Energy Solution will add battery recycling to their Ohio battery-cell plant campus in 2023, the companies said Thursday. Battery recycling company Li-Cycle plans to open a recycling center near the Ultium battery-cell plant, centralizing a crucial piece of the electric vehicle supply chain.

Ultium Cells, a joint venture for battery development that GM and LG Energy Solutions formed in 2019, will build the recycling center on the site of its battery cell plant in Warren, Ohio. The Ultium plant is under construction, with production expected to begin in August.

Li-Cycle will install and operate its proprietary technology and equipment at the recycling plant after construction is complete, Li-Cycle and Ultium Cells said in a statement Thursday.

As automakers and battery manufacturers scale EV and battery production, battery recycling will become an essential part of the EV supply chain. Recycling shrinks the carbon footprint of battery manufacturing, and building batteries with recycled materials, rather than virgin materials, reduces the cost. Today, used-battery volume is too low to create significant recycling demand, but that will change as automakers launch more EVs. GM plans to launch 30 EVs globally by mid-decade and aims to convert its entire lineup to EVs by 2035.

"Our collaboration with Li-Cycle is an instrumental step in improving the sustainability of our components and manufacturing processes. This facility is another bold step forward in our sustainability journey here at Ultium Cells," Kevin Kerr, Ultium Cells' Ohio plant director, said in a statement.

The proximity between the cell and recycling plants will enable faster conversion of battery manufacturing scrap and will substantially reduce the costs associated with moving and handling battery manufacturing scrap materials, the companies said.

As Li-Cycle expands, the company has said it plans to add "spokes" within about 200 miles of battery-cell plants. GM is planning to open at least three other battery-cell plants in the U.S. The second will be in Spring Hill, Tenn.. The third will be in Lansing, Mich., GM said this week as the automaker promised to invest nearly $7 billion in EV and battery manufacturing in Michigan. GM has not yet said where the fourth plant will be located.

"Building this spoke facility alongside Ultium Cells' plant is expected to substantially optimize costs and logistics as we transform manufacturing scrap from the plant into highly valuable material, using our unique, sustainable and fit-for-purpose approach," Ajay Kochhar, CEO and co-founder of Li-Cycle, said in the statement.

Once production has ramped up, Li-Cycle's plant will have the capacity to process up to 15,000 metric tons of battery manufacturing scrap and battery materials annually. The plant is expected to be fully operational in early 2023.

The primary output at the plant will be black mass, a powderlike substance that includes lithium, cobalt and nickel, elements essential to EV batteries. Li-Cycle will convert the mass into battery-grade materials at its facility in Rochester, N.Y., scheduled to open in 2023.

Li-Cycle in May partnered with Ultium Cells with a goal of recycling up to 100 percent of the scrap from battery-cell manufacturing. Ninety-five percent of the cobalt, nickel, lithium, graphite, copper, manganese and aluminum from Ultium batteries can be used in new batteries or for adjacent industries.

Li-Cycle developed a spoke-and-hub model that takes in lithium ion batteries and battery production scrap from its regional commercial spokes in the U.S. and Canada. It separates the battery materials into three streams: plastics, metals and a black mass of cathode-anode material that contains key battery components, such as lithium and cobalt.

The black mass goes to the hub in Rochester, where Li-Cycle extracts lithium carbonate, cobalt sulphate, nickel sulphate and manganese carbonate.

The Ohio recycling plant will be Li-Cycle's fifth in North America and largest spoke facility.