Circular economy strategies for electric vehicle batteries reduce reliance on raw materials
Circular economy strategies for electric vehicle batteries reduce reliance on raw materials
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DOI：
10.1038/s41893-020-00607-0
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发表时间：
2020-09-07
影响因子：
27.6
通讯作者：
Heidrich, Oliver
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Baars, Joris;Domenech, Teresa;Heidrich, Oliver
新的电池化学物质可以帮助减少电动汽车对Co的依赖。然而，为了避免将负担转移到镍等其他资源，加强电池可追溯性和回收的循环经济战略可能会大大减少汽车行业对一氧化碳的需求。电动汽车广泛采用锂离子电池将需要增加汽车行业的自然资源。预计电池的快速增长可能会导致新的资源挑战和供应链风险。为了加强汽车供应链的弹性和可持续性，减少对初级资源的需求，需要制定循环经济战略。在这里，我们将说明这些策略如何减少主要原材料的提取，即钴的供应。材料流分析用于了解整个欧盟电动汽车电池中嵌入的钴的当前和未来流动。提出了一个参考方案，并与四种战略进行了比较：技术驱动的替代和技术驱动的减少钴，新的商业模式，以刺激电池的再利用/回收和政策驱动的战略，以增加回收。我们发现，新技术提供了最有希望的战略，以减少对钴的依赖，但可能会导致负担转移，如镍的需求增加。为了避免后者，技术发展应与有效的回收系统相结合。我们的结论是，迫切需要在政府和企业层面制定更雄心勃勃的循环经济战略，以成功应对整个供应链当前和未来的资源挑战。
New battery chemistry can help reduce the reliance on Co for electric vehicles. However, to avoid burden shifting to other resources such as Ni, circular economy strategies with enhanced battery traceability and recycling could contribute substantially to the reduction of primary Co demand from the automotive industry.The wide adoption of lithium-ion batteries used in electric vehicles will require increased natural resources for the automotive industry. The expected rapid increase in batteries could result in new resource challenges and supply-chain risks. To strengthen the resilience and sustainability of automotive supply chains and reduce primary resource requirements, circular economy strategies are needed. Here we illustrate how these strategies can reduce the extraction of primary raw materials, that is, cobalt supplies. Material flow analysis is applied to understand current and future flows of cobalt embedded in electric vehicle batteries across the European Union. A reference scenario is presented and compared with four strategies: technology-driven substitution and technology-driven reduction of cobalt, new business models to stimulate battery reuse/recycling and policy-driven strategy to increase recycling. We find that new technologies provide the most promising strategies to reduce the reliance on cobalt substantially but could result in burden shifting such as an increase in nickel demand. To avoid the latter, technological developments should be combined with an efficient recycling system. We conclude that more-ambitious circular economy strategies, at both government and business levels, are urgently needed to address current and future resource challenges across the supply chain successfully.