Fire hits new battery plant

A fire in a pallet has broken out days before the commissioning of the UK’s first industrial scale facility for recycling lithium-ion batteries.

According to a BBC report, half of the Li-Batt Recycling factory in Wolverhampton was damaged by smoke. Fire damage was limited to a pallet of lithium-ion batteries weighing about 130kg. The local fire service reported no-one was hurt and the operators said the plant reopened the next day as normal. The fire was contained within one of seven bays used to store batteries before processing.

Investment

The new Li-Batt site, part of Recyclus Group, is due to start commissioning operations within days. Recyclus has invested £6 million (EUR 7 million) in the recycling of batteries in electric vehicles, e-bikes, mobile phones, computer lap-tops and industrial applications.

According to the company, once the Wolverhampton site is fully operational, the ambition is to increase its lithium-ion battery recycling capacity from an estimated 8 300 tonnes in the first full year of operations, to circa 41 500 tonnes by 2027. Recyclus plans a further four such plants that in the UK. It believes it can supply up to 20% of the UK’s requirements for rare metals needed for batteries from recycling.