Entered a business in prison.Recycling heretic challenges the EV battery crisis overrun

A mountain of wooden boxes piled up high.What if Indie Jones 51st?

No, it's a battery warehouse.The inside of the box is the battery collected from the half -dead EV.The person who is standing in Niou is Eric Lundgren, who launched a company called BIGBATTERY from prison in a business that reused it into a storage battery of the solar panel.It looks sunny after finishing the task!

Electric vehicles (EV) battery materials are nickel, lithium and cobalt.The mining is the poor children of the Congo, so it is said that using a limited resource until it is worn down is the biggest challenge in the century this century.

According to experts's latest estimates, the toxic waste produced by one million Batteries sold in 2017 is really 250,000 tons!In the 2020s, it is expected to increase even more magnitude.

Lundgren wants to make a profit while reusing it a little and reducing the environmental impact.He answered the interview:

"Garbage is not the opponent. This is a mountain of diamonds"

"The company has about 50 employees now, but it has already been $ 7 million since its founding in August 2019 (about 7)..600 million yen) is also invested, and we have purchased used lithium -ion batteries from half of US automakers from the secondary distribution market.With zero reclaimed zero as a policy, all purchased are reused in products that are valuable, or resold the battery parts after resold.In 2019, we signed a contract of $ 43 million (about 4.7 billion yen) in the used EV battery processing project. "

Isn't it in great shape ...!When I interviewed Simon Lambert, a co -manager in charge of the Lithium -ion battery reuse of the British Faraday Foundation (Relib), "If there is a way to purchase a large amount of battery packs, a commercially available battery is commercially available.It is enough to be diverted to, and "theoretical" is a story that it is profitable.

While the translation is all about, in the United States, it is fake to make a small amount of panels in the above photo and make a large amount, collect a total of $ 1 billion in investment from the investment god Warren Buffett, and work in Roku.DC Solar co -founder Jeff CARPOFF (49) and PaUlette Carpoff (46), who called 180 cars to the company's party and bought 180 cars, were sentenced to Ponge Skeme for 15 years.The imprisonment is being sentenced, so the endorsement of an expert is very encouraging ~ Yes.

Well, I thought, "Why did you go bankrupt?"I will post 149 videos of the 180 cars that I am worried about.1) In the name of the owner, the number of seized products that were auctioned out was "the highest ever in the history of the officer."idiot….

Lundgren is collecting such a helpless company, including such a helpless company.His history of gadget recycling is old, he has been hooked since he was 16 years old, and in 2012, he started a “hybrid” (melting and diverted) recycling company in 2012.However, in the same year, hundreds and thousands of Windows repair discs created for referral bishes were caught in Microsoft and court battle, and I argued that such a financial value was zero, but the damage was $ 700,000 due to copyright violations.In June 2018, he was arrested and detained, and was sentenced to a fine of $ 50,000 and a 15 -month imprisonment.It has become a big news in Gizmodo.

However, it is also a time to be free on the wall, so hire a small elite team, order a new company specializing in battery reuse, then enter prison, and in prison, a letter, client, and partnership in letters.BIGBATTERY is the one who continues to contact the first time, has a meeting at the meeting time, and has "launched everything from prison".

Thanks to his serious attitude, he was released three months earlier, and in June 2019, when he returned to society, the "switch on" started.It is surprising that the first warehouse, which was 7,000 square meters in less than a week, was filled.The company's current battery output capacity is a total of 407 megawatts, which is equivalent to one day of 1,4,000 US homes.

The EV battery has a long life of several years to decades, so there is still a long life when BIGBATTERY buys.

For example, this is also mixed in the purchase.

・ I can't use a car due to a traffic accident, but the battery is not scratched.

・ Battery modules (composition batteries) can be removed in 1 or 2 points out of the dozens of points.

Therefore, employees make an assessment every day, and consider how to recycle based on the data.As for the flow, the technician with a specially high -voltage electrical handling business qualified to cut the main power supply, secure a state where no one is shocked, and then test it with the team.If a voltage test is confirmed to be unable to restart, it will be turned into a normal recycling processing with other OEM cases (compressing and melting to extract used ingredients).If you know that you can still store electricity, we will check the battery with three charging and determine the application.After the inspection, the same grade is put together from the usable cells and modules, and the battery of various sizes and bolts is processed.

According to Lundgren's apparent, the majority of EV batteries that are used as used still have more than 80%of power storage capacity.The company's founder, Paul Shmotolokha, who undertakes overseas sales from the company, said, "Even if it can not be used for car driving, it can still be used as a reserved battery for recycled energy," and "Transportation technology for some use (transport).He said that he was looking forward to the future because he could replace it with another purpose and fulfill his role. "

The battery of the electric kickboard is more common alongside the car.I get caught with cars and people.It can be a Buddha in a few months after using it, but Lundgren says that the battery inside is almost 10 years old.It's really wasteful!So, nowadays, it is now taken out of 75,000 electric kick boards and can be used in camping (1 piece 1).8kg)?

No one knows the number of EV batteries on the market, so the market size of BIGBATTERY is not really known.Simon Lambert of the Faraidy Foundation says that it is very difficult to track because it is rarely collected by the car, kickboard and bus, because it is rarely collected by cars, kickboards and buses.Lambert seems to be that the actual situation of the EV -equipped battery will last for 10 to 20 years.

The only thing that is clear is that the EV battery often ends the first cycle and becomes a waste, and the recycle industry is booming for it.Lambert's new companies in Britain only include HyperDrive Innovation and Connected Energy, and Spiers New Technologies, which was born in Oklahoma five years ago in Oklahoma, is also "Life Cycle Management" for automakers in the United States.・ Reward / reuse) is provided and EV battery packs are recycled at 2,000 per month.

BIGBATTERY also opened the Singapore New Logistics Center and the new Hong Kong base one after another, expanded 13,470 square meters in the US Cutsworth, and turned into a profit in November 2019.They are aiming to double the processing by the end of the year, saying, "It will be crazy."

If the industry is mature, there are difficult issues.Batteries are difficult to handle, and if you make a mistake, you will explode, poison gas emission, electric shock, so safety is the top priority in recycling (the company has the R2 that has cleared the safety, health and environmental standards of the United States Environmental Protection Agency.A recycle) certified company, all batteries are shipped in packaging by the Ministry of Transport, and are conducting firefighting training for lithium -ion batteries every six months).

Battery design and raw materials are evolving rapidly, and recently it requires customization of processing, and it takes time and manpower.The development is "hundreds of millions of yen".In addition, the remaining amount is abundant because it is still used for the first time, but if the second and third recycled products come around in the future, there is a difficulty that the application will be limited.

There are also anxiety factors that rarity metals, including cobalt and other rares, are becoming increasingly rare due to the soaring demand for global lithium -ion batteries.The pressure of the competition was inevitable, and the recycling could be wrinkled, and Gavin Harper, a Fellow Foundation researcher, said.Since cobalt is absolutely necessary, if you have time to convert the battery for power storage for power networks, you can dissolve it and mine it for EV.

"The tug of war continues depending on whether the market principle is prioritized or the effects of resources effectively. It is difficult to balance" (Harper).

Nathan Proctor, a consumer organization's US Public Profit Investigation Group (PIRG), summarizes the "right to repair" campaign, said about BIGBATTERY, "Reducing things to make is essential to breaking away from disposable society.Reusing things is the shortest route of breaking away. "Lambert's words, "If you don't reuse it, it will be difficult," so is EV for the first time after cleaning up.