Mercedes-Benz has opened a new battery recycling plant covering all steps from shredding battery modules to drying and processing active battery materials.
The plant in Kuppenheim, Germany, will sort and separate plastics, copper, aluminium and iron in a complex, multi-stage process.
Meanwhile, a downstream hydrometallurgical process is dedicated to the so-called black mass – active materials that make up the electrodes of the battery cells.
Also, the valuable metals cobalt, nickel and lithium are extracted individually in a multi-stage chemical process.
These recyclates are of battery quality and therefore suitable for use in the production of new battery cells.
The recovered materials will feed into the production of more than 50,000 battery modules for new all-electric Mercedes-Benz models.
Mercedes-Benz has invested tens of millions of euros in the construction of the new facility, which has an annual capacity of 2,500 tonnes.
Its technology partner for the battery recycling factory is Primobius, a joint venture between German plant and mechanical engineering company SMS group and Australian process technology developer Neometals.
The expected recovery rate of the mechanical-hydrometallurgical recycling plant is more than 96 percent.
Ola Källenius, Chairman of the Board of Management of Mercedes-Benz Group AG said, “Mercedes-Benz has set itself the goal of building the most desirable cars in a sustainable way.
“As a pioneer in automotive engineering, Europe’s first integrated mechanical-hydrometallurgical battery recycling factory marks a key milestone towards enhancing raw-materials sustainability.
“Together with our partners from industry and science, we are sending a strong signal of innovative strength for sustainable electric mobility and value creation in Germany and Europe.”