Doosan joins hands with China’s CNGR for battery recycling

South Korea’s plant and machinery powerhouse Doosan Group has teamed up with China’s CNGR Advanced Material Co. to expand its electric vehicle battery recycling business, which the company has targeted as a new growth driver.

Doosan Recycle Solutions, a wholly owned battery recycling subsidiary of the group’s power plant builder Doosan Enerbility Co., on Friday signed a cooperation deal with CNGR, the world’s top lithium-ion battery cathode precursor maker, for the recycling business.

CNGR agreed to provide Doosan Recycle Solutions with waste battery powder containing key materials such as lithium, nickel and cobalt, while the South Korean company is slated to extract only lithium from the powder and return the other ingredients to its Chinese partner for its precursor production.

“The two companies are expected to satisfy each other’s needs with their technology and improve business competitiveness through the agreement,” said Doosan Recycle Solutions CEO Choi Jaehyuk in a statement.

NEW FACILITY

The company plans to establish a commercial production facility in South Korea by next year to extract lithium from some 3,000 tons of waste batteries a year from 2026.

Doosan Recycle Solutions is set to use its own technology to collect lithium from waste secondary batteries for CNGR.

The technology treats waste battery powder with heat and separates lithium using pure water to extract lithium carbonate or lithium hydroxide through the crystallization method.

The process is simpler than other technologies, improving the economics of extraction and raising lithium purity to higher than 99.5% and collection rates to more than 85% through eco-friendly methods without chemicals, the company said.

Write to Sang Hoon Sung at uphoon@hankyung.com
 
Jongwoo Cheon edited this article.