Fortum has announced the expansion of its battery recycling operations. In February 2021, the company will open a new mechanical recycling processing plant located in Ikaalinen, Finland. The new plant will complement Fortum’s existing hydrometallurgical pilot facility in Harjavalta, Finland, which is already capable of operating on an industrial scale. 

Fortum said it is committed to engage its customers and societies to decarbonise and to help them in decreasing their environmental footprint. Moving forward, CO2-neutral societies will rely on battery technology. The company has been developing new and increasingly efficient ways to optimise the entire lifecycle of lithium-ion batteries for several years now and aims to further expand its battery operations in the coming years, according to the statement. 

“Our new plant in Ikaalinen will enable us to leverage our existing recycling operations in Finland and will give us the annual capacity to recycle approximately 3,000 tonnes of used batteries, corresponding to about 10,000 EV batteries,” said Tero Holländer, Head of Business Line Batteries at Fortum. “We aim to steadily increase this capacity in the coming months and years in order to bridge the raw materials gap faced by the automotive industry with the electrification of transportation. Providing recycled and sustainable raw materials for batteries will bring significant value not only to our partners and customers but also to Finland’s battery industry, which is well poised to take the lead in the supply chain for EV batteries.” 

The global lithium-ion battery recycling market was worth about EUR 1.3 billion in 2019, but it is expected to boom in the coming years to over EUR 20 billion. According to a forecast by the International Energy Agency, the number of electric vehicles on the world’s roads will increase from three million to 125 million by 2030.