Li-Cycle, Renewance form partnership

June 9, 2021

Original article published in Recycling Today

Li-Cycle Corp., a recycler of lithium-ion batteries based in Mississauga, Ontario, has entered into a partnership with Renewance, a life-cycle battery management company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, to deliver safe, sustainable and cost-effective lithium-ion battery recycling solutions for end-of-life energy storage systems.

According to a news release from Li-Cycle, the deployment of energy storage systems has progressed in recent years, and the U.S. energy storage market is set to grow to 26.5 gigawatt hours annually by 2025 and will account for 50 percent of the global market this year, according to the U.S. Energy Storage Monitor and IHS Markit. By combining their respective strengths in lithium-ion battery recycling and battery life cycle management software and services, Li-Cycle and Renewance report that they plan to play a role in helping developers and utilities decommission energy storage systems safely, recovering the valuable materials from within the end-of-life batteries and returning those materials to the economy.

“This partnership with Renewance is a major breakthrough for us as we make considerable inroads in the energy storage market, which is going through substantial growth and in turn will produce a substantial supply of end-of-life batteries that need to be recycled,” says Kunal Phalpher, chief commercial officer of Li-Cycle. “We will enhance Renewance’s abilities to deliver value through efficiently managing its clients’ batteries through our spoke facilities, strategically located close to regions with high penetration of energy storage systems.”

According to Li-Cycle, the two businesses have been collaborating on energy storage projects since the beginning of 2020, and the parties believe that, with the formalization of their partnership, they are well-positioned to grow the scope and scale of energy storage system lithium-ion batteries requiring recycling continue to grow. Li-Cycle’s recently announced third commercial lithium-ion battery recycling facility (or “spoke”) in Gilbert, Arizona, will be critical in this regard due to its proximity to California. Li-Cycle’s spoke facility in Rochester, New York, will also be essential in recovering resources from end-of-life lithium-ion batteries from energy storage systems on the U.S. East Coast.

“Renewance and Li-Cycle share the same mission to enable a more sustainable battery energy storage ecosystem,” says Tom Newhall, chief operating officer of Renewance. “We bring a wealth of experience on regulatory considerations to decommissioning and reverse supply chain processes and Li-Cycle brings a strong capability of recovering critical battery materials from lithium-ion batteries in a sustainable and safe manner. We are looking forward to working closely with Li-Cycle on this mutually beneficial partnership.”