 | |
| Type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | |
| Founded | 2017 |
| Founder | J. B. Straubel |
| Headquarters | , |
Key people |
|
| Website | redwoodmaterials |
Redwood Materials, Inc. is an American company headquartered in Carson City, Nevada. The company aims to recycle lithium-ion batteries and produce battery materials for electromobility and electrical storage systems. [1] Redwood Materials was reported to have a valuation of about $3.7 billion as of July 2021. [2]
Redwood Materials was founded by J. B. Straubel, who was a co-founder and served as chief technology officer at Tesla, Inc. for 16 years. Redwood set out to create a circular supply chain for electric vehicles and clean energy products, making them more sustainable long term and driving down the cost for batteries by developing a fully closed loop for lithium-ion batteries. Redwood sought to recycle batteries, recapturing valuable materials to help make new batteries. [3]
On its website in 2022 Redwood Materials explained that the company received enough end-of-life batteries annually to provide critical materials for new batteries for about 60,000 new electric vehicles. Redwood estimated that it was recovering more than 95% of the metals (including nickel, cobalt, lithium, and copper) from end-of-life batteries. [4]
Redwood then produces strategic battery materials, supplying battery manufacturing partners with anode copper foil and cathode active materials. [4]
Redwood is partnered with companies such as Panasonic, Ford Motor Company, and Amazon. [5]
Along with Ford and Volvo, Redwood Materials launched a used battery collection program for the state of California in February of 2022. Ford, Volvo and their dealers planned to work with battery dismantlers and ship old vehicle batteries to Redwood Material's plant in Carson City, Nevada. [6]
In 2021, the company announced it had received US$775M from various investors in a financing round. This will be used to build a production facility that will produce battery materials from recycled materials, starting at 6 GWh per year. [7] By 2025, the capacity of the production facilities is to be expanded to 100 GWh, enough for one million electric vehicles. By 2030, capacity is expected to increase to 500 GWh. [1]
Redwood secured a $2 billion conditional low-cost loan awarded by the US Department of Energy's Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program in February 2023. The company which relies primarily on Asia for importing essential components to make EV batteries said it would use the funds to build a supply base in the US and expand operations by building a facility in Charleston, South Carolina. [8] Redwood acquired German recycling company Redux in 2023. [9]
In March 2023 Redwood claimed to have recovered more than 95% of important metals (incl. lithium, cobalt, nickel and copper) from 500,000 lb (230,000 kg) of old NiMH and Li-Ion packs. [10]
Investors in Redwood Materials' $775M Series C include T. Rowe Price, Goldman Sachs, Baillie Gifford, Fidelity, Ford Motor Company and Amazon's Climate Pledge Fund. [11]
A lithium-ion or Li-ion battery is a type of rechargeable battery which uses the reversible reduction of lithium ions to store energy. The negative electrode of a conventional lithium-ion cell is typically graphite, a form of carbon. This negative electrode is sometimes called the anode as it acts as an anode during discharge. The positive electrode is typically a metal oxide and is sometimes called the cathode as it acts as a cathode during discharge. Positive and negative electrodes remain positive and negative in normal use whether charging or discharging and therefore are clearer terms than anode and cathode, which are reversed during charging.
Tesla, Inc. is an American multinational automotive and clean energy company headquartered in Austin, Texas, which designs and manufactures electric vehicles, stationary battery energy storage devices from home to grid-scale, solar panels and solar shingles, and related products and services. Its subsidiary Tesla Energy develops and is a major installer of photovoltaic systems in the United States and is one of the largest global suppliers of battery energy storage systems with 6.5 gigawatt-hours (GWh) installed in 2022.
The lithium iron phosphate battery or LFP battery is a type of lithium-ion battery using lithium iron phosphate as the cathode material, and a graphitic carbon electrode with a metallic backing as the anode. Because of their lower cost, high safety, low toxicity, long cycle life and other factors, LFP batteries are finding a number of roles in vehicle use, utility-scale stationary applications, and backup power. LFP batteries are cobalt-free. As of September 2022, LFP type battery market share for EVs reached 31%, and of that, 68% was from Tesla and Chinese EV maker BYD production alone. Chinese manufacturers currently hold a near monopoly of LFP battery type production. With patents having started to expire in 2022 and the increased demand for cheaper EV batteries, LFP type production is expected to rise further and surpass lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxides (NMC) type batteries in 2028.
Jeffrey Brian Straubel is an American businessman and electrical engineer. He spent 15 years at Tesla, as chief technical officer until moving to an advisory role in July 2019. In 2023, he was elected to the company's board of directors.
Battery recycling is a recycling activity that aims to reduce the number of batteries being disposed as municipal solid waste. Batteries contain a number of heavy metals and toxic chemicals and disposing of them by the same process as regular household waste has raised concerns over soil contamination and water pollution.
An electric vehicle battery is a rechargeable battery used to power the electric motors of a battery electric vehicle (BEV) or hybrid electric vehicle (HEV).
Cobalt is a chemical element with the symbol Co and atomic number 27. As with nickel, cobalt is found in the Earth's crust only in a chemically combined form, save for small deposits found in alloys of natural meteoric iron. The free element, produced by reductive smelting, is a hard, lustrous, silvery metal.
The electric vehicle industry in China is the largest in the world, accounting for around 57.4% of global production of electric vehicles (EVs) and around 500,000 exports in 2021. In 2021, CAAM reported China had sold 3.34 million passenger electric vehicles, consisting 2.73 million BEVs and 0.6 million PHEV, which is around 53% share of the global market of 6.23 million "new energy" passenger vehicles – BEVs, PHEVs, and HEVs. China also dominates the plug-in electric bus and light commercial vehicle market, reaching over 500,000 buses and 247,500 electric commercial vehicles in 2019, and recording new sales of 186,000 commercial EVs in 2021.
Fisker Inc. is an American automotive company founded by Henrik Fisker and his wife Geeta Gupta-Fisker. Launched in 2016 and based in Manhattan Beach, California, Fisker Inc. is the successor to Fisker Automotive.
Electric cars have a smaller environmental footprint than conventional internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEVs). While aspects of their production can induce similar, less or alternative environmental impacts, they produce little or no tailpipe emissions, and reduce dependence on petroleum, greenhouse gas emissions, and health effects from air pollution. Electric motors are significantly more efficient than internal combustion engines and thus, even accounting for typical power plant efficiencies and distribution losses, less energy is required to operate an EV. Manufacturing batteries for electric cars requires additional resources and energy, so they may have a larger environmental footprint from the production phase. EVs also generate different impacts in their operation and maintenance. EVs are typically heavier and could produce more tire and road dust air pollution, but their regenerative braking could reduce such particulate pollution from brakes. EVs are mechanically simpler, which reduces the use and disposal of engine oil.
Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Limited, abbreviated as CATL, is a Chinese battery manufacturer and technology company founded in 2011 that specializes in the manufacturing of lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles and energy storage systems, as well as battery management systems (BMS). With a market share of 32.6% in 2021, CATL is the biggest lithium-ion battery manufacturer for EVs in the world, producing 96.7 GWh of the global 296.8 GWh, up 167.5% from the prior year. It grew even further in 2022, increasing its market share to 37%. The company plans to have a manufacturing capacity of more than 500 GWh by 2025 and more than 800 GWh by 2030.
Huayou Cobalt Co., Ltd primarily operates as a supplier of cobalt and its associated products, such as cobalt tetroxide, cobalt oxide, cobalt carbonate, cobalt hydroxide, cobalt oxalate, cobalt sulfate, and cobalt monoxide. The company is headquartered in the Tongxiang Economic Development Zone of Zhejiang, China.
The lithium nickel cobalt aluminium oxides (abbreviated as Li-NCA, LNCA, or NCA) are a group of mixed metal oxides. Some of them are important due to their application in lithium ion batteries. NCAs are used as active material on the positive pole (which is the cathode when the battery is discharged). NCAs are composed of the cations of the chemical elements lithium, nickel, cobalt and aluminium. The most important representatives as of this date have the general formula LiNixCoyAlzO2 with x + y + z = 1. In case of the NCA comprising batteries currently available on the market, which are also used in electric cars and electric appliances, x ≈ 0,8, and the voltage of those batteries is between 3.6 V and 4.0 V, at a nominal voltage of 3.6 V or 3.7 V. A version of the oxides currently in use in 2019 is LiNi0,84Co0,12Al0,04O2.
Northvolt AB is a Swedish battery developer and manufacturer, specialising in lithium-ion technology for electric vehicles. Founded in 2015 by two former Tesla executives, it commissioned its first manufacturing plant in Skellefteå, Sweden in 2021 and has announced plans for five others in Europe and North America.
Lithium batteries are primary batteries that use lithium as an anode. This type of battery is also referred to as a lithium-ion battery and is most commonly used for electric vehicles and electronics. The first type of lithium battery was created by the British chemist M. Stanley Whittingham in the early 1970s and used titanium and lithium as the electrodes. Unfortunately, applications for this battery were limited by the high prices of titanium and the unpleasant scent that the reaction produced. Today's lithium ion battery, modeled after the Whittingham attempt by Akira Yoshino, was first developed in 1985.
This is a history of the lithium-ion battery.
The electric vehicle supply chain comprises the mining and refining of raw materials and the manufacturing processes that produce lithium ion batteries and other components for electric vehicles. The lithium-ion battery supply chain is a major component of the overall EV supply chain, and the battery accounts for 30%-40% of the value of the vehicle. Lithium, cobalt, graphite, nickel, and manganese are all critical minerals that are necessary for electric vehicle batteries. There is rapidly growing demand for these materials because of growth in the electric vehicle market, which is driven largely by the proposed transition to renewable energy. Securing the supply chain for these materials is a major world economic issue. Recycling and advancement in battery technology are proposed strategies to reduce demand for raw materials. Supply chain issues could create bottlenecks, increase costs of EVs and slow their uptake.
Electra Battery Materials Corporation is a Canadian multinational corporation engaged in mining and refining raw materials for electric batteries. Electra owns and operates the first fully permitted metallurgical refinery in North America for producing battery-grade cobalt and nickel sulfate. The company also owns the Iron Creek cobalt-copper deposit in Lemhi County, Idaho, US.
Lohum is an Indian battery developer and manufacturer, specialising in lithium-ion technology for electric vehicles. The company headquartered in Noida, Uttar Pradesh.