The Battery Cake: Can We Get the Ingredients Back?

aus Wissen schafft Macht. Macht aber nix. Oder? WISM²ANO Ein Podcast der BioteXpert*innen · 24.09.2026 · 29 Min.

Beschreibung

A used car battery is more like a cake: lithium, nickel, cobalt and graphite are mixed and layered together — and getting those ingredients back out separately is one of the biggest challenges in battery recycling. Today, only around 10–12% of lithium-ion batteries make it back into the loop at all, with much of that recovery coming from the steel casing. In this episode, Cejna Anna Quist-Jensen, coordinator of the 13-partner Horizon Europe project BeyondBattRec, explains why better recycling may start before a battery ever reaches the shredder. We talk about 1,000°C smelters, bacteria that produce sulfuric acid for bioleaching, and why Europe’s biggest lithium mine might already be sitting in people’s driveways. In This Episode What actually happens inside a smelter running above 1,000°C, and where the lithium ends up Why BeyondBattRec argues the problem isn't the acid at the end of the process, but the shredder at the beginning How graphite is pulled out of the black mass by flotation, before any leaching happens Where Europe gets its lithium from, and what the "urban mine" has to do with that The EU target: 80% lithium recovery by the end of 2031 — and whether that's realistic Guest Cejna Anna Quist-Jensen , Associate Professor, Aalborg University (Department of Chemistry and Bioscience). She is a membrane researcher who has spent years recovering salts and metals from contaminated liquid streams — seawater, industrial wastewater, and now battery leachate. She co-coordinates BeyondBattRec together with Aamer Ali. Further Reading BeyondBattRec — Project website Goals, work packages, and the consortium's latest publications. CORDIS factsheet, Grant Agreement 101193032 13 partners, 7 countries, running through the end of 2028. European Commission: New rules to boost recycling efficiency from waste batteries The EU Battery Regulation and its recovery targets, in plain language. Välimets et al. (2026), Waste Management — Biogas-derived sulfur enhances microbial sulfuric acid production The acib publication out of Tulln on the sulfur-eating bacteria — open access. Navarrete-Segado et al. (2026), Energy Storage Materials — Sustainable strategies for graphite anode regeneration Why graphite is the overlooked part of every battery — co-authored by Cejna's co-coordinator Aamer Ali, open access. Shirazi, Ali & Quist-Jensen (2024), Desalination — Membrane crystallization for recovery of lithium carbonate crystals⁠⁠ Cejna's own work on exactly the step she describes on air — turning the leached solution into lithium carbonate via membrane crystallization. Not open access. ⁠ Die BioteXperten, Season 1, Episode 18 — with Silja Välimets The episode Kathi refers to in conversation. Funding Acknowledgement This episode was produced within the framework of BeyondBattRec, a project funded by the European Union under the Horizon Europe research and innovation programme (Grant Agreement No. 101193032). Views and opinions expressed are those of the guest and host only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the granting authority; neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.