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Step Inside The Factory That Recycles 95 Percent Of EV Batteries

A screenshot from a YouTube video showing an EV battery being loaded onto a machine.
A screenshot from a YouTube video showing an EV battery being loaded onto a machine.

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Up, up and away.

The first EV to go on sale in the U.S. might have been way back in the 1890s, but it’s not been until more recently that the tech has taken off and been adopted by America’s motorists. Now, battery-powered models account for six percent of new car sales in the States and around three percent of all vehicles assembled here.

But while the tech might still be relatively new, there is still a steady stream of battery-powered cars being taken off the road and into the scrap heap. Whether it’s due to damage in a collision or simply because something newer and more efficient has come along, all cars meet their end eventually.

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Instead, companies have been looking into ways to reclaim and recycle these metals, with the aim of eventually putting them to use in brand new batteries that can power the next generation of electric cars. Now, YouTuber Zack Nelson who runs the JerryRigEverything channel has taken a look inside one of the factories working to do just that.

The video, which is linked above, shows how U.S.-based Li-Cycle breaks EV batteries down into the plastics and metals that make them up, ready to be recycled and reused once again.

At the start of the process, a waste battery from an electric car is loaded onto a conveyor that takes it to the top of a machine. Nelson explains that the battery is then passed through a sort of shredder, which is flooded with a special liquid that prevents the whole process from ending in disaster.

A photo of a bag of shredded plastic from battery recycling.
A photo of a bag of shredded plastic from battery recycling.