(Bloomberg) — The world’s biggest lithium miner wants to extract more of the battery metal from old cars as demand surges and aging electric vehicles are traded in.
Albemarle Corp. is making investments and partnering with automotive equipment manufacturers on the recycling effort, which it calls “critical” to its future growth.
The miner is part of a growing list of companies looking to grab a share of the market for recovered battery materials as lithium supplies show signs of tightening.
Thirteen years after the Tesla Roadster made its debut, a first generation of EVs is nearing retirement, making more battery packs available. Once that happens, recycling is going to “take off,” said Christopher Perrella of Bloomberg Intelligence.
“It is very early stages, it’s something we’re investing in now,” Eric Norris, Albemarle’s head of lithium, said in an interview.