Task 4.5: Improvement of recyclability of small battery packs

Objective:

The second use and recyclability of battery packs is a subject of high concerns and debate within the automotive world. Tesla has recently introduced battery packs that do not allow maintenance. Essentially the design is made much more robust avoiding access to the battery pack. Essentially the same approach already implemented on cellular phones and many other portable devices.

Increasing its lifetime by making the battery pack much more robust is now considered more important than allowing maintenance. This is even more true for small battery packs used in e-bikes whose production cost is of the order of 150€ or in smaller batteries used in IoT devices in agriculture. The issue then becomes the recycling of the components when the battery pack is considered obsolete or damaged.

Within this task, several aspects that affect small batteries lifetime and their recyclability will be studied to obtain new solutions that will lead to new, small battery designs with lower environmental impact for their application in agriculture and e-bikes. The intended activities that will be carried out within this task will cover the development of new materials to replace the more hazardous materials that form part of the traditional solutions, the design of new packages, the testing of the obtained batteries, and testing the recyclability of the new battery packs.

This task is strongly related to UC10. Soil probe, the use of the new small battery packs developed during the task will contribute to improve the devices used for the soil probe in terms of better recyclability.

The results of T4.5 will be compiled in D4.10, in which the advances and improvements achieved by partners will be reflected.


T4.5.1. Materials.

SubtaskFrom the point of view of materials, within this task novel materials for easy recyclable batteries will be developed. Activities will focus on obtaining recyclable current collectors by replacing conventional PVDF binders with bio-based binders and obtain NMP-free solvents inks (NMP is one of the most toxic solvent used in current Li-ion fabrication process). Also, to eliminate toxic and flammable compounds formed during the recycling process due to the liquid electrolyte, the last will be replaced by a non-flammable gel electrolyte. In addition, the use of recycled materials for the production of batteries will be studied.

Subtask T4.5.2. Dismantling process

Regarding the dismantling process, the state of the art of the applicable dismantling processes will be studied, including performances and costs (manufacturing and dismantling costs). Besides, the impact of the different options related to geometries, joining technologies, etc. will be analysed to define the design rules/criteria that leads to simpler and more efficient dismantling processes.

Subtask T4.5.3. Testing

The battery prototypes obtained within this task will be tested extensively to characterise performances and to validate the environmental impact. In this regard, cycling characterizations will be performed to evaluate the power density and the energy density of the new eco-batteries. Also, post-mortem analysis will be applied to understand the materials behaviour after battery cycling.Subtask T4.5.4. Test the recyclability of the new battery prototypes

Once the battery prototypes have been designed, produced, and tested, they will be recycled, using the process already developed by CSIC, to probe that these new battery packs are easier recycle than the commercial ones.

Task Leader : ORBX

Involved Partners : TST, IFEVS, CSEM, CSIC, IFEVS, TST, CSIC
Involved Partners >>