Toronto-based battery recycler Li-Cycle has landed a conditional US$375-million loan from the United States Department of Energy, based on its plans to build a new plant in a suburb of Rochester, New York.
The 26-hectare site in Greece, NY, “will reprocess materials from a number of recycling sites Li-Cycle is building in the U.S. and Canada,” Canary Media reports. “Li-Cycle has pledged to invest $485 million in the facility, which is set to open late this year with the capacity to produce enough lithium carbonate and other materials to supply about 203,000 electric vehicles per year.”
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The project “will include a plant that will use the company’s hydrometallurgical system to process up to 35,000 tonnes of black mass—e-waste from crushed and shredded battery cells—per year, for use in new lithium-ion batteries,” the Globe and Mail writes. “That is equivalent to about 18 gigawatt-hours of battery capacity.”
The Globe says Li-Cycle is pursuing a circular economy strategy that “involves using its own technology to recycle battery materials, including those from electric vehicles, energy storage, and consumer electronics.” With four North American supply “spokes” feeding the Rochester hub from Ontario, New York, Arizona, and Alabama, the company says it will process more than 50,000 tonnes of lithium ion battery material per year. Li-Cycle is also developing new supply sources in Germany and Norway.
It’s the second time DOE’s Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing program has approved a loan for a battery recycler, Canary Media says.
“The Biden administration has been looking to develop the domestic supply and production of lithium-ion battery materials to ease its dependence on China, which makes most of the world’s lithium-ion battery materials today,” the news story states. “As the number of EVs on the road grows, minerals and metals from their depleted lithium-ion batteries could make up an increasingly significant share of ongoing demand, and at much lower costs and environmental impacts than extracting those raw materials from mines.”
The loan is “the first for a pure-play battery materials recycling company,” the Globe says. “The U.S. DOE says it can make loans to foreign-owned or -sponsored companies as long as the manufacturing takes place in the United States.”
Li-Cycle’s shares on the New York Stock Exchange were up 4% after the announcement, and Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) took the opportunity for a home-state victory lap.
“Last year, I stood alongside Li-Cycle’s powerhouse work force and promised I would push to deliver federal funding to spark more growth,” he declared. “Now thanks to the investments I secured in the Inflation Reduction Act, Rochester will help power America’s drive to lead in battery technology.”
