Beyond a second life, the batteries can also be recycled, with 95 per cent of the components able to be reused. That is a solution Perth-based lithium miner Neometals is pursuing, with the company building its own recycling plant in Canada. Neometals managing director Chris Reed stands and smiles with the company’s reception area in the background. Neometals managing director Chris Reed says the miner is joining the recycling game. “It’s really a cradle-to-grave solution at Mount Marion [mine], we are producing the lithium units and then recycling,” Neometals managing director Chris Reed said.

As lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries continue to electrify our world, over 11 million tonnes of spent Li-ion batteries will be discarded through to 2030. This means a very significant opportunity exists for Li-ion battery recycling. Neometals has co-developed a Li-ion battery recycling technology to economically recover high-value cobalt (99.2% recovery). Recently, the company has constructed a recycling hydrometallurgical pilot plant in Ontario, Canada where wet commissioning has commenced. The plant will complete continuous test work at a rate of 100kg/day of batteries, testing the recovery of high-purity cobalt, lithium, nickel and other base metals from lithium batteries typically used in the electric vehicles (Lithium-Nickel-Manganese-Cobalt or NMC).