American Manganese Inc. (TSX-V:AMY, OTCQB:AMYZF), doing business as RecycLiCo Battery Materials, and its R&D partner Kemetco Research Inc, said that the leach section of its demonstration plant project has achieved over 99% extraction of lithium, nickel, cobalt, and manganese from lithium-ion battery production scrap.
The company said that to date, the demonstration plant has leached a few metric tons worth of lithium-ion battery production scrap, the primary source of recyclable materials, which comes from losses in the battery cell manufacturing process due to incompliant quality.
"I'm thrilled with the limits we have been able to push during this pivotal step of our demonstration plant project as it is core to our patented process and a limiting factor that defines the commercial design capacity," commented Zarko Meseldzija, CTO and director of American Manganese in a statement.
READ: American Manganese highlights CO2 emission reducing potential of RecycLiCo process
"The demonstration plant's growing number of achievements provides reliable technical data for third-party due diligence and checks many boxes regarding efficiency, capacity, and practicality that engages discussions regarding bespoke commercialization plans and influences successful commercial partnerships," he added.
"Given the scrap's intrinsic value, it can be viewed as a resource instead of waste material, and the battery manufacturers will ultimately dictate the supply of their scrap steams. However, with the increasing value and shortage of battery materials, battery manufacturers have a stronger incentive to recycle in-house. Integrating our patented process alongside battery production scrap sources could enable battery manufacturers to build an internal closed-loop supply chain that recovers scrap materials and introduces upcycled material back into battery remanufacturing," Meseldzija concluded.
The company cited data from Benchmark Mineral Intelligence that battery scrap will account for 78% of the pool of recyclable materials in 2025 and remain a significant recyclable source beyond 2030.
American Manganese is a battery materials company focused on recycling and upcycling lithium-ion battery waste, while Kemetco Research is a private sector integrated science, technology, and innovation company.
Contact the author at jon.hopkins@proactiveinvestors.com