Focus on the future: why do we recycle lithium batteries?
1.1. The electric vehicle industry is developing rapidly, and the number of retired power lithium-ion batteries is huge
The global new energy vehicle industry is developing rapidly. In 2020, the global sales of new energy vehicles were 3,095,200 units, a year-on-year increase of 40.16%, of which pure electric vehicles sold 2,126,100 units, a year-on-year increase of 29.58%. Under the impact of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, they rose against the trend. We predict that the growth rate of global new energy vehicle sales is expected to exceed 30% in 2021-25, and sales will exceed 13 million by 2025.
my country's new energy vehicle industry emerged in the early 21st century. Since the "Ten Cities, Thousand Vehicles" project was launched in 2009, new energy vehicles were promoted and applied in 2013-14 and the purchase tax was exempted. Announcement on the Promotion and Application of Fiscal Support Policies for New Energy Vehicles in 2018, which implements the GSP system for subsidies for the purchase of new energy vehicles, and financial subsidies have become an important rising force in promoting my country's new energy industry. With the gradual decline of subsidies for the purchase of new energy vehicles, the "double points" policy, which was launched in 2017, continues to promote the development of the new energy industry. We predict that the growth rate of my country's new energy vehicle sales will stabilize at 30%-40% in the next five years, and it is expected to exceed 6 million by 2025.
Driven by the rapid rise of the electric vehicle market, power lithium-ion batteries continue to maintain a rapid upward trend. According to the cathode material, power lithium-ion batteries can be divided into ternary batteries, lithium iron phosphate batteries and other batteries. At present, the overseas market is dominated by ternary batteries, while domestic ternary batteries and lithium iron phosphate are developing simultaneously. The annual newly installed capacity of global power lithium-ion batteries has maintained a steady increase. We expect the installed capacity to reach 623GWh in 2025; the domestic installed capacity can reach 312GWh. Among them, the installed capacity of ternary batteries reached 174.5GWh, and the installed capacity of lithium iron phosphate reached 137.4GWh.
1.2. Under the trend of global electrification, the constraint geometry of lithium resources
In the context of carbon neutrality, the electric vehicle and energy storage market will rise rapidly, according to BNEF's forecast for 2020:
(1) From 2020 to 2040, the global sales of electric passenger vehicles will increase from about 2 million to about 55 million (about 3300GWh, calculated at 60kWh/vehicle), which is 27.5 times that of 2020;
(2) From 2020 to 2050, the cumulative installed capacity of the global energy storage market will increase from about 20GWh to about 1700GWh, which is 85 times that of 2020.
If the cumulative amount is calculated based on an 8-year replacement cycle of electric vehicles, and assuming that most of the installed energy storage capacity uses lithium batteries, the demand for lithium batteries will reach 25TWh in 2020-2060. , the demand for lithium carbonate is about 15 million tons.
Judging from the exploration volume of lithium resources in the world, we do not need to worry about insufficient lithium resources, but we still need to pay attention to regional resource constraints.
(1) Lithium in the salt lake has a higher resource. If the purification technology can be improved and the production cost can be reduced, the problem will be better solved;
(2) Compared with other regions in the world, China has less high-quality lithium resources. Considering that my country is the core of the lithium battery midstream industry chain and the downstream application market, resource constraints must be considered;
(3) From the perspective of lithium salt production, cost distribution and lithium price trends, different resource endowments and regional policies lead to different mining difficulties, investments, and costs. There will be a certain mismatch between supply and demand at different times and regions in the future, and lithium prices will fluctuate sharply. Inevitably, if lithium prices rise sharply, it will be detrimental to the realization of the carbon neutral vision.
Therefore, taking into account environmental protection factors, regional constraints on lithium resources, and lithium price factors, it is also necessary to recycle used lithium-ion batteries.
1.3. Market space for secondary utilization and material recycling of power lithium-ion batteries
1.3.1. Spatial prediction of power lithium-ion battery scrap and echelon utilization
We have designed a calculation model for the metal recycling market space of ternary batteries and the cascade utilization and recycling market space of lithium iron phosphate batteries in the future. First, we make the following assumptions:
(1) Ternary battery:
1) During the cyclic charge and discharge process, the battery capacity will gradually decay, and when the decay falls below 80%, it will reach the retirement state. Usually, the service life of power lithium-ion batteries is about 5 years. We assume that the effective life of the ternary battery and the lithium iron phosphate battery is 5 years. Therefore, as of now, the first batch of power lithium-ion batteries has reached the retirement age, and will usher in a more sustainable and expanding power lithium-ion battery recycling market in the future. Under this assumption, the ternary (lithium iron phosphate) batteries installed in 2014 will be dismantled and recycled in 2019, the ternary (lithium iron phosphate) batteries installed in 2015 will be disassembled and recycled in 2020, and so on. .
2) The dismantling and recycling method is mainly adopted for the disposal of decommissioned ternary batteries. Dismantling and recycling is important to recycle and reuse metal materials such as cobalt, nickel, manganese, and lithium in the positive electrode material, and the positive electrode material is divided into NCM333, NCM523, NCM622, NCM811, etc., and different technical routes have different energy densities. With the development of the ternary battery industry, high nickel and no cobalt have become important development trends. We make assumptions about the proportion of each metal in the cathode material in the coming years and make calculations.
(2) Lithium iron phosphate battery:
1) On September 28, 2017, five departments including the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Finance, and the Ministry of Commerce jointly announced the "Measures for the Parallel Management of Passenger Vehicle Companies' Average Fuel Consumption and New Energy Vehicle Points", namely the "double points" policy, emphasizing that Improve the energy density of new energy vehicle batteries. Due to the disadvantage of lithium iron phosphate battery energy density, its market competitiveness once declined. After the subsidy policy has declined, due to the continuous rise of cobalt prices, cobalt-free batteries are favored by the market, while the safety of high-nickel ternary batteries needs to be further improved. At the same time, the continuous deepening of CTP technology and the increasing demand for low-cost batteries, phosphoric acid Lithium-iron batteries are back to life.
2) The decommissioned lithium iron phosphate battery should be used in stages first, and then dismantled and recycled. At present, the recycling and cascade utilization system is not perfect, and there are also economic problems in lithium recycling, but we believe that with the support of policies, as well as the rise of the energy storage market and the constraints of lithium resources, the market and economy will gradually improve. In the calculation, we made assumptions about the proportion of cascade utilization, and the proportion gradually increased from 5% in 2019 to 80% in 2030, and made relatively extreme assumptions for lithium iron phosphate batteries that did not enter the cascade utilization system, namely Assuming that it enters the dismantling and material recycling system, otherwise it will pollute the environment and cause environmental costs.
3) We assume that the kWh of the positive lithium iron phosphate before the upgrade is 2.4kg/kWh, and it becomes 2.3kg/kWh after the upgrade, and assume that the market will gradually transition from low energy density iron lithium ion batteries to high energy density in 17-20 years The energy density of lithium iron ion batteries and lithium iron phosphate batteries remains the same before and after they are scrapped.
4) Energy storage is one of the application scenarios of lithium iron phosphate batteries, but due to its long application cycle, generally more than 15-20 years, the scrapping of lithium iron phosphate batteries in the energy storage market is not considered for the time being.
5) Regarding the lithium iron phosphate battery after the cascade utilization, it will be dismantled to recover the lithium element after 3 years. Regarding ternary batteries, we estimate that in 2019, it is estimated that 1,300 tons of ternary positive electrodes can be recycled, and then it will increase year by year to 292,500 tons in 2030.
Calculate the metal recovery amount according to each type of ternary positive electrode, and add up the total metal recovery amount of the ternary battery:
1) NCM333: As the NCM333 ternary battery installed in 2014 began to retire in 2019, the recycling volume of NCM333 gradually increased from 2019 to 2022, reaching a peak of 12,800 tons in 2022, and then gradually decreased due to the withdrawal of NCM333 until 2026 The annual recycling volume is zero;
2) NCM523: NCM523, which began to enter the market in 2016, will be scrapped and recycled in 2021, and then the recycling volume will stabilize between 40,000 tons and 60,000 tons in 23-28 years, and it is expected to rise to 107,800 tons in 2030;
3) NCM622: The NCM622 that entered the market in 2017 will be scrapped and recycled in 2022, and the recycling volume will increase slightly until the increase in 28 years. It is estimated that 60,300 tons can be recycled in 2030;
4) NCM811: The NCM811 that entered the market in 2018 will be scrapped and recycled in 2023, and it is expected to rise to 124,400 tons in 2030.
It is estimated that in 2030, 20,900 tons of lithium, 114,700 tons of nickel, 28,000 tons of cobalt, and 32,300 tons of manganese can be recovered.
Regarding lithium iron phosphate batteries, we predict:
1) In 2030, the scrapped iron-lithium-ion battery will reach 313,300 tons;
2) As the cascade utilization increases year by year, it is expected that the iron-lithium-ion batteries that can be used in cascade will reach 109.93GWh in 2030, a total of 250,600 tons; the remaining 62,700 tons will be dismantled and recycled, and 2,800 tons of lithium can be recovered;
3) The lithium iron phosphate batteries used in cascade in 2027 will reach the scrapping standard in 2030. At this time, 86,040 tons will be dismantled and recycled, and 3,790 tons of lithium can be recovered. A total of 6,500 tons of lithium can be recovered from the two.
1.3.2. Prediction of market space sensitivity of power lithium-ion battery scrap and cascade utilization
As metal price changes have a huge impact on the economics, market release and output value of power lithium-ion battery recycling and cascade utilization, we have designed the metal recycling market space for ternary batteries and the recycling and cascade utilization market space of iron-lithium-ion batteries in the future. Price sensitivity analysis and make the following assumptions:
2) When conducting the sensitivity analysis, while changing the metal market price, the proportion of cathode materials of ternary battery and the proportion of lithium iron phosphate battery echelon recovery remain unchanged.
3) We assume that the price per watt-hour of lithium iron phosphate batteries will decrease from 2.17 yuan/Wh in 2014 to 0.55 yuan/Wh in 2025, and the rate of reduction will gradually slow down in 21-25 years. The residual value price of cascade utilization is divided into three grades: high (40%), medium (30%), and low (20%) for residual value conversion.
When the metal is at a high price, the market space for ternary battery lithium/nickel/cobalt/manganese recycling is expected to be 195.82/176.63/186.13/640 million yuan by 2030. When the metal is at the current price, the ternary battery lithium/nickel/cobalt/manganese recycling market space is expected to be 103.67/154.24/85.80/529 million yuan in 2030. When the metal is at a low price, the market space for ternary battery lithium/nickel/cobalt/manganese recycling is expected to be 81.68/73.65/54.41/300 million yuan in 2030. From 2020 to 2030, the cumulative recycling space of ternary batteries will reach 130.5 billion yuan at current prices.
Under the high residual value, the market space for the use of iron-lithium-ion batteries in 2030 is estimated to be 24.124 billion yuan, the medium residual value is estimated to be 18.093 billion yuan, and the low residual value is estimated to be 12.062 billion yuan. In the case of medium residual value, the cumulative market space of iron-lithium-ion battery echelon utilization in 2020-2030 will reach 68 billion yuan.
When lithium metal is at a high price, the market space for lithium iron phosphate lithium-ion battery recycling is expected to be 6.117 billion yuan in 2030, 3.238 billion yuan at current price, and 2.552 billion yuan at low price. From 2020 to 2030, the cumulative lithium recycling market space for lithium iron phosphate batteries will reach 16.3 billion yuan at current prices.
