Black mass production involves processing the shredded materials from a dead battery, including lithium, nickel, cobalt and manganese.
According to the company, the produced black mass contains high amounts of the key metals used to produce cathode active materials (CAM) and can be used as a feedstock for the commercial hydrometallurgical refinery for battery recycling that BASF plans to build around 2025.
This investment will create about 30 new production jobs, with startup planned for early 2024, the company said.
“With this investment in a commercial scale battery recycling black mass plant, we take the next step to establish the full battery recycling value chain at BASF,” said Dr Peter Schuhmacher, president of catalysts. “The closed loop from end-of-life batteries to CAM for new batteries, supports our customers along the entire battery value chain, reduces the dependency from mined raw materials and enables a circular economy.”
