Leicester team invents new battery recycling method

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A team led by Leicester University has developed a new battery recycling method using ultrasonic waves to separate valuable materials from electrodes.

The method has been developed with the Faraday Institution to tackle recycling of electric vehicle (EV) batteries. Leicester University's Professor Andy Abbott, project leader, compared the process to the way in which a dentist’s ultrasonic descaler works, breaking down adhesive bonds between the coating layer and substrate. 

“This novel procedure is 100 times quicker and greener than conventional battery recycling techniques and leads to a higher purity of recovered materials,” he said in a statement.

Current methods for lithium-ion battery recycling usually involve feeding end-of-life batteries into a shredder or high-temperature reactor, with a complex set of physical and chemical processes required to produce useable materials.

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If end-of-life batteries are disassembled rather than shredded, there is potential to recover more material in a purer state. Disassembly of lithium-ion batteries has been shown to recover around 80 per cent of the original material.

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