NUE•NUE•Recycling batteries, solar panels, wind turbines and aging grid equipment is creating new supplies of materials used in the energy transition. The IEA estimates recycling could supply 20% to 30% of global lithium, nickel and cobalt demand by 2050.
The shift to electric vehicles, renewables, battery storage and expanded power grids is increasing demand for copper, rare earths, silver and other materials, while new mines and processing infrastructure can take years to develop. Recycling retired energy-transition equipment is emerging as another source of supply.
Redwood Materials says it recovers more than 95% of lithium, nickel, cobalt and copper from spent batteries and manufacturing scrap, processing more than 20 gigawatt-hours of batteries annually and producing over 60,000 metric tons of critical materials each year. The IEA estimates recycling could provide 20% to 30% of global lithium, nickel and cobalt demand by 2050. Researchers have also demonstrated solar-panel recycling processes that recover silicon at up to 99.998% purity and silver at 99.7% purity, with roughly 97% recovery yields. Rystad Energy estimates the value of recyclable solar-panel materials could grow from around $2 billion currently to roughly $80 billion by 2050.
Veolia has developed a process that turns wind-turbine blades into pellets that can replace coal, silica and limestone in cement kilns; REGEN Fiber makes reinforcement fibers for construction-related industries. Nucor operates facilities that recover copper and other non-ferrous metals from retired grid equipment for use in new transmission components. Mining will remain necessary, the article notes, because demand growth is too large for recycling alone to meet.
