EV Batteries Getting Second Life On California Power Grid (reuters.com) 80
Hundreds of used electric vehicle battery packs are enjoying a second life at a California facility connected to the state's power grid, according to a company pioneering technology it says will dramatically lower the cost of storing carbon-free energy. Reuters reports: B2U Storage Solutions, a Los Angeles-based startup, said it has 25 megawatt-hours of storage capacity made up of 1,300 former EV batteries tied to a solar energy facility in Lancaster, California. The project is believed to be the first of its kind selling power into a wholesale market and earned $1 million last year, according to Chief Executive Freeman Hall. B2U's technology allows the EV battery packs to be bundled together without having to be taken apart first. Founded in 2019, the company is backed by Japanese trading company Marubeni Corp.
By extending the batteries' lives, project developers can save both resources and costs. Hall estimates that a system like B2U's could lower grid-scale battery capital costs by about 40%. "Second life and re-use helps the overall lifecycle be more energy efficient, given all the efforts that go into making that battery," Hall said in an interview. "So you're getting maximum value out of it." Batteries are worked hard during their years powering vehicles, and over time their range deteriorates. But they still hold value as stationary storage, which has gentler demands, Hall said. The batteries in the B2U system are up to 8-years old and once powered vehicles built by Honda and Nissan.
By extending the batteries' lives, project developers can save both resources and costs. Hall estimates that a system like B2U's could lower grid-scale battery capital costs by about 40%. "Second life and re-use helps the overall lifecycle be more energy efficient, given all the efforts that go into making that battery," Hall said in an interview. "So you're getting maximum value out of it." Batteries are worked hard during their years powering vehicles, and over time their range deteriorates. But they still hold value as stationary storage, which has gentler demands, Hall said. The batteries in the B2U system are up to 8-years old and once powered vehicles built by Honda and Nissan.
Re:That's flat out wrong. (Score:5, Funny)
You went one story too far.
Guess that kind of proves the point about sleep apnea and getting distracted, though.
Re: That's flat out wrong. (Score:2)
We'll, I guess that's wrong too. D'Oh!
Take a good look (Score:1)
This is what will be the death of the inexpensive beater car. Once a used BEV is worth more scrapped for its battery, this will be its fate.
I've said it many times before, BEV batteries will never become cheap until every conceivable use case for inexpensive batteries has been satiated. It's simple supply and demand economics.
Re:Take a good look (Score:5, Informative)
Batteries are worth less as they age, but are always worth at least the value of the lithium they contain.
A typical EV contains about 12 kg of lithium.
Lithium is traded on commodity markets as lithium carbonate, Li2CO3, which is 20% lithium.
There has been a recent price surge for lithium carbonate, but the price is expected to settle back down to about $50/kg as production rises to meet demand.
12kg * ($50/kg / 0.20) = $3000.
So that is the price floor for used BEVs.
Re:Take a good look (Score:4, Insightful)
Just look at plastic. Plastic does cost money, yet consumer-recycled plastic has less than $0 value - it's generally just buried.
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Companies are already recycling BEV batteries. Here is one of many videos covering it.
https://youtu.be/6w78-aSTIDY?t... [youtu.be]
Yes, if the materials value drops to zero or below then they will get buried. That requires a different solution.
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Less the cost of extracting it... It's $50/kg raw, not in need of processing.
It makes more sense to reuse batteries anyway. Even degraded ones store useful amounts of energy, and with some work to make replacing the anode easier they could be rejuvenated before having to be broken down into constituent parts again.
The other big issue that needs addressing is making it easier to replace batteries in cars. Even where they are relatively easy to access, they have proprietary connections for things like cooling
And the problem is? (Score:5, Insightful)
This is what will be the death of the inexpensive beater car. Once a used BEV is worth more scrapped for its battery, this will be its fate.
I've said it many times before, BEV batteries will never become cheap until every conceivable use case for inexpensive batteries has been satiated. It's simple supply and demand economics.
Anyone who has a well-loved drill gun already knows this: when the batteries fail, replacement batteries cost as much as a new tool. The housing and motor (and case) are almost negligible expenses tamped down by economies of scale, compared to the extra expense the manufacturer has for selling the battery pack.
While your statement is true, it's phrased in the manner of a problem. Is this a problem?
BEVs have much longer lifetime than ICE cars, both in years and mileage driven. If the replacement battery in your used vehicle drives the value up - is that really a bad thing?
Selling a used car is a well-known game-theory problem in non-symmetric information. The seller knows that the car is good or bad, but the buyer doesn't and has no easy way to find out (that the transmission needs replacing, or the brakes are shot, etc). Because of this, the buyer has to factor in the probability that the car is a lemon, and will only pay a lower price for the car. The sellers of good used vehicles don't want to sell at a reduced price, so they do something else with the vehicle (like give it to someone in the family), which removes the good used vehicles from the market, which increases the probability of getting a lemon, which drives the price even lower... and repetitive application of this logic leads to the conclusion that used cars have no value. (In practice, very little, and the reason why many used cars come with a warranty now.)
A used BEV will not have non-symmetric information, because the battery health can be easily determined and the rest of the car is cheap relative to the cost of the battery. The electric motors either work or they don't, and the electronics has a bunch of sensors and diagnostics that ICEs don't have.
There are currently about 1.4 billion vehicles on the road now, assuming BEV sales double every 2 years (the "S" curve of technology uptake), that's about 10 doublings or 20 years to saturate the BEV market worldwide.
If this leads to lots and lots of grid-scale backups in factories across the nation, then it's a good thing.
If your used vehicle has value due to the battery, then that's a good thing also.
I'm wondering if there's an actual problem here?
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I'm wondering if there's an actual problem here?
Prior to all the pandemic-induced pricing nuttiness, the value of a used car could drop all the way to its scrap value. Unless you're dealing with a particularly exotic car, ICE vehicles mostly consist of steel, aluminum, and various synthetic materials, all of which are not particularly valuable in the quantities found in an average car. It wasn't unusual to see a junkyard offer $500 or less for a scrap vehicle.
This low pricing floor meant there was an entire segment of used vehicles available to people
Re:And the problem is? (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think that it is a broken window situation because I don't think that an otherwise useful chassis will go to the junkyard all that often, just because the battery goes to a non-mobile use.
I see some scenarios for batteries going to these uses:
1. Battery no longer meets owner's range needs. They purchase a new or refurbished pack with more capacity, and the old battery/cells find their way to the grid storage facility.
2. The car is crashed, but the battery is intact. Such as a car with a rear battery that is damaged in the front.
3. The car is otherwise wrecked. Smoker with dogs and kids with markers and hammers. It's just too nasty, but battery still salvageable. Another option is that the motor(s) are failing, but everything else is also marginal, so repair not economical.
Even if the junkyard gets one, if they can slap a "new" battery in it, possibly smaller than OEM(so 100 miles rather than 300), and sell it for a profit larger than parting it out, they'll do so.
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Even if the junkyard gets one, if they can slap a "new" battery in it, possibly smaller than OEM(so 100 miles rather than 300), and sell it for a profit larger than parting it out, they'll do so.
This would be equivalent to putting a new ICE drivetrain in a junkyard vehicle today, which pretty much doesn't happen unless the vehicle is collectable.
As a hypothetical example, say you have a 15-year-old BEV. The interior is pretty rough, the suspension makes weird noises and it definitely doesn't provide such a great ride anymore. The exterior has a few fender benders, the paint has faded and there's a bit of rust which needs some TLC. The battery no longer delivers adequate range.
You're not going to
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I want to point out that your hypothetical example fits scenario #3. "Everything" is marginal, so repair isn't economical. The vehicle is effectively wrecked.
The difference between putting a new drivetrain into a junkyard vehicle and a new battery is labor costs. It takes a lot of labor to replace an engine, which translates to "expensive", and labor cost isn't something you're getting back.
Meanwhile, it shouldn't take more than a single hour to replace an EV battery with the proper tools and equipment,
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Technically, just like the battery, it might have residual value. Besides the steel content, you have that you're probably not putting a completely new drive-train into it, but a "refurbished" one. Where you give the seller the old engine back to avoid a "core charge". They will then tear apart the engine you took out and either fix it or scavenge it for what is still usable.
A lot of engines can actually be repaired as well, it just takes an expert machine shop to do it economically.
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The interior is no big deal. Anyone with a socket wrench and some basic body tools can replace seats and carpet. The reason people don't usually do that is by the time the interior gets bad enough to refresh, the rest of the car is a wreck.
I have no doubt the economics of the BEV era used car market will be radically different from the ICE era. But I don't think those differences will be as driven by battery replacement costs as many people think. Those costs are going to drop with economies of scale. W
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The software is the real killer. A perfect storm of a manufacturer that has lost interest in updating or supporting it and a system with lock-outs out the ass to make sure someone doesn't find a way to activate the heated seats without paying through the nose for it wrecks the resale value or even renders it worthless.
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Since the battery is by far the most expensive part of the car, it's going to be cheaper to buy a new car than replace a battery.
Like when someone forgets the change their oil and the engine fails, the car is usually scrapped for parts, since there's no point spending $20k replacing an engine when you can buy a new or second hand car
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A reasonably well maintained gas engine will continue working for a long time, there have been cases of gas engines clocking over a million miles. The gas tank will still hold the same quantity of gas it did the day it was made, as gas tanks don't generally shrink (although there have been exceptions where blockages and a powerful fuel pump cause tanks to implode).
A battery pack on the other hand is going to degrade even if well maintained, so by the time you sell your car it may provide only a fraction of
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But yes if the battery of an EV fails outside warranty it is generally totalled. Now the nice part: except from wear and tear that is not likely to happen. When they say that the battery is unsuitable for EV's it means the capacity has dropped below 75~80%. So instead of 400 you get 300.
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Fuel usage only goes up on poorly maintained ICE, and can often be brought back down again with some relatively cheap servicing. It's quite possible to keep a 30+ year old ICE in good order with its original engine at a relatively cheap cost, especially if you're not concerned about appearance like the interior becoming tatty.
EV batteries are a lot more like phone or laptop batteries, and most people likely have experience of phones or laptops where the battery has degraded to the point that the device need
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But yes if the battery of an EV fails outside warranty it is generally totalled.
From what I'm seeing, this is no longer true. I've read of a number of cases where cars have had their batteries replaced outside of warranty - it's just that:
1. EV batteries aren't failing all that often, in reality
2. Replacement non-OEM batteries haven't been readily available, and are still working their way onto market. Ergo, prices still a bit high
3. Probably because BEV makers have been battery constrained, so a battery sold for your used car is a battery they can't put into a new car, to sell th
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Several things wrong with your comment:
Since the battery is by far the most expensive part of the car, it's going to be cheaper to buy a new car than replace a battery.
I've never understood why people believe this, when common sense tells you otherwise. A battery costs X. The car (minus the battery) costs Y. X+Y=Z (total cost of a new car). How do people come to the incorrect conclusion that X is greater than Z? Even the highest estimates I've seen for a replacement on a new battery are in the $20k range, for cars that are selling for well over $40k, because...duh.
the car is usually scrapped for parts, since there's no point spending $20k replacing an engine when you can buy a new or second hand car
Having just gone through an engine replacement (at a dealership,
Re:And the problem is? (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't think this is going to be a problem for long. As you say, those beaters are driven by people who have a completely different expectation. Taking the kids to school, getting groceries, and getting to work do NOT require a 300 mile range.
The average distance driven daily by people who don't drive for a living in the U.S. is less than 30 miles. Taking a used BEV that has had the original 300-mile range battery removed gives you an opportunity to put a 75-mile range battery in there. That's 1/4 the power density in the same physical space, so no need for power-dense, expensive lithium. Or 1/4 the space of lithium for the same power density if you'd rather lose some weight and not deal with changing charge circuits for different chemistries.
Once enough BEVs pass the post and become used scrap, minus batteries, that means there will be a market for shade-tree electro-mechanics to put together 75-mile power packs with adapted charging circuits. As BEVs have less wear on them in general than ICE cars, there should be a very nice market for reliable, used BEVs.
I can easily see after-market batteries in low and medium range packs for common, used BEVs.
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"because the battery health can be easily determined"
Not true. The reported health of the battery can be reset to hide if from the next common user.
" the electronics has a bunch of sensors and diagnostics that ICEs don't have."
Each of these another point of failure and repair cost.
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"because the battery health can be easily determined"
Not true. The reported health of the battery can be reset to hide if from the next common user.
Batteries can be tested very easily with a load.
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That's not my experience. I bought into the Black & Decker Max system a long time ago (maybe 8 years?) and have ended up buying hundreds of dollars of tools in that system. An OEM battery is $
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Lots of products with high demand are cheap. Competition will drive down the price to a little more than the cost of production, which will continue to go down.
You're severely underestimating the demand for batteries. Every home capable of having a PV installation could go off-grid if batteries were cheap enough.
As it is, just present demand for batteries has created a lithium shortage to the point it's hard to find lithium grease on the shelves. And we're nowhere close to electrifying every car on the road.
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Anyone who has a well-loved drill gun already knows this: when the batteries fail, replacement batteries cost as much as a new tool. The housing and motor (and case) are almost negligible expenses tamped down by economies of scale, compared to the extra expense the manufacturer has for selling the battery pack.
Maybe the old drill motor ran on cheap and crappy NiMH packs, whereas todays tools all use more expensive but far better Li-ions? Also I've noticed that most tool manufacturers have standardized packs (didn't always used to be the case), and sell their battery powered tools without the battery and charger, though you will find "value packs" with the batteries and charger included. Which makes sense: you can share batteries between tools and save money, and at the same time it's an incentive to buy your ot
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Mostly agree, but it is a little more complicated. If you look at various EVs that are old enough to be selling second hand in significant numbers, there are a few issues that need a little more investigation than simply checking the battery health with an OBD-II device.
The Nissan Leaf battery sometimes doesn't show issues at higher state of charge, so you need to check the battery health with it run down to below 20%. Ideally charge it to 100% on AC, then run it down, then check it.
Various Tesla models hav
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Grid storage using used lithium ion battery packs is viable today, but won't be in ten years as grid-specific technologies like iron-air and liquid metal batteries come onto the market.
Toyota did this too as a publicity stunt (Score:2)
but they didn't want to share any of the details on how they did it because Toyota really isn't happy with people reusing their batteries.
So much for Toyota's SDGs and environmental contribution.
https://www.theguardian.com/su... [theguardian.com]
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Except they used Nissan and Honda batteries, not Toyota.
Old news (Score:2)
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Did any of them reach 25 megawatt-hours in capacity?
No, but the TFS didn't mention Tesla and That Cannot Be Allowed To Stand.
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- minus 1, redundant - (Score:2)
Batteries that still have useful life are being repurposed? Amazing! Who woulda thunk of such a genius idea? I wonder if there is any other resource that can continue its useful life when it has accomplished its original purpose. Just think of the possibilities! We could call it something like, um, how about recycling?
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We could, but that would be dumb, because this is *re-use*, which is different. Recycling is the next thing that happens, when the batteries are broken down and the lithium etc are extracted.
They need a second life for nuclear power plants (Score:3, Interesting)
While California is looking for ways to keep the lights on while lowing CO2 emissions they've been shutting down nuclear power plants. Nuclear power is the safest source of energy known to exist, with some sources putting it in at least the top three. Nuclear power is the lowest emitter of CO2 per energy produced, again with some sources putting it in the top three. Nuclear power cost less than rooftop solar PV or offshore wind by a wide margin, and if not driven to bankruptcy by bad government policy it can be cheaper than coal.
I'll read people complain on how nuclear power plants can't ramp their power output up and down quickly so therefore are worthless for power to the grid. Well, what are all these batteries for? Wind and solar can't manage the variable demand either so there's all these plans to put batteries on the electric grid. Then in the issue of what happens if there is a problem at a nuclear power plant. Well, we have this grid that is connected to send solar power across the country so we can use sunlight on one coast to keep lights on for the other coast, if we lose a nuclear power plant for some reason we can divert the power to make up for it. Unlike wind and solar power a bunch of nuclear power plants aren't going to go off line because of the weather. We have nuclear power plants operating in the middle of deserts, in the middle of ice storms, in the middle of hurricanes, and worse. These are weather events that would clearly damage solar and wind power production.
It it nice to see California taking steps to keep the lights on but they aren't going far enough. They need to invest in nuclear power. Along with this hate of nuclear power is a hate of hydroelectric power. California needs dams. They need dams not just for electricity but for mitigating against droughts and floods. They need water desalination plants also to make sure there is enough water to drink.
More batteries on the grid is nice but that's just a teeny tiny part of what needs to be done to keep the state a place people would want to live in. They need reliable sources of energy, reliable sources of water, and so much more. If they can't bring themselves to build more nuclear power plants then they will have serious problems keeping the lights on very soon.
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" Nuclear power is the safest source of energy known to exist, "
How do you figure that Solar is more dangerous than nuclear?
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I get there by looking at data"
https://commons.wikimedia.org/... [wikimedia.org]
As many will point out that Wikipedia is not a primary source. The primary sources are given in the commentary below the chart. If you have a problem with the source then I suggest looking into the sources on how they got their data. Since this is but one of many sources showing similar data I am confident I would be able to continue to find far more sources to defend that nuclear power is safer than solar power. This is especially true wit
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or its too hot Too hot in Germany and France [reuters.com]
or it freezes (for examples see Texas , Salem (note mention of subsidies required) [utilitydive.com], Canada [sott.net],
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Nuclear does not run 24/7/365/. Nuclear fails every time when you need to take it offline for maintenance and refuelling (3-4 weeks)
That's not failure, that's scheduled maintenance. I guess solar and wind don't any of that?
Re: They need a second life for nuclear power plan (Score:2)
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How do you figure that Solar is more dangerous than nuclear?
In terms of deaths per TWh generated claimed by the industry. Solar is bad only because the industry accepts it. Most deaths occur during installation, which stands to reason given the cowboy nature of most solar installation companies.
Nuclear is nice, but NOT cheaper!! (Score:5, Insightful)
Nuclear power cost less than rooftop solar PV or offshore wind by a wide margin, and if not driven to bankruptcy by bad government policy it can be cheaper than coal.
You overreached there. If what you said was true, why are so few new plants being built? All the experts I've read, including nuclear fans, concede that the barrier is not NIMBYs, but the actual cost...and it makes perfect sense. You want to say that asinine liberal regulations prevent nuclear from being profitable?...OK...then why isn't it the dominant power source in every totalitarian state that doesn't have to answer to NIMBYs or "woke" liberals, yet has nuclear technology? China's nuclear power share is 5%. Israel has no nuclear power plants.
Believe me, I wish what you said was true...but it's not. Nuclear power has been with us for decades. If our idiocy was the only thing holding us back from nuclear powered glory, there are many nations with nuclear technology who don't have American values or idiocy or whatever you're ranting against. Russia has 20% nuclear power....seems kind of low for a nuclear pioneer with a low regard for individual rights.
Why isn't electricity too cheap to meter in France? They have 70% nuclear power...yet their electricity costs more than ours. They also have perpetual maintenance issues for the plants, so it's not as reliable as you pretend it is.
Think about it. If our attitudes were the only thing keeping us from nuclear glory, why aren't we building plants anywhere we can far out of reach of the NIMBYs? Sure, it makes sense that the rich liberals of San Francisco who used to be hippies would protest a nuclear power plant, but what about rural Texas? Georgia? Florida? Utah? What about our military territories where the locals don't really have a say? There are a lot of places that would LOVE cheap power...If you could produce power too cheap to meter, the old promise from 60 years ago, we'd set them up out in the middle of nowhere for industrial use. You don't even need to be near a population center You can generate a lot of profitable fertilizer and aluminum products from surplus electricity. People would setup nuclear power plants in the middle of nowhere and power all sorts of mega factories with cheap electricity.
I wish you were right. I wish what you said was true, but you're either severely misinformed or disingenuous. Please stop spreading fairy tales.
If you have places to store nuclear waste (Score:2)
like a deep ocean or mountain then nuclear is a nice solution.
But don't come complaining when Godzilla walks by after consuming your nuclear waste.
Re: If you have places to store nuclear waste (Score:2)
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The other issue with nuclear is that there aren't many places where it can be deployed. It needs a source of water, like a river of a certain size, or the sea. It needs stable geology and geography that allows it to consume large amounts of water, and not get clogged up or damage the local ecosystem too much. There just aren't that many places where you can build them.
Comparing to solar is a trick nuclear fans like to do. It's obviously daft because nobody is suggesting we replace all nuclear power and foss
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They need access to extensive water resources, which many coal plants don't have. They need physical security for the nuclear material and waste products. They need geological stability and shelter from other kids of rare natural disasters.
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Actually, they don't absolutely need access to large amounts of water. That is just a way to make them cheaper.
You can totally aircool a nuclear plant, you just need to spend some millions more to build the necessary cooling. We're doing that right now in the US, with one of our biggest nuclear plants being in the desert. The older reactors used treated sewage, but they are moving away from that.
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Comparing to solar is a trick nuclear fans like to do. It's obviously daft because nobody is suggesting we replace all nuclear power and fossil fuels with solar. It's part of a mix of renewable sources, and has the unique property of democratizing energy generation by letting people do it themselves. Owning the means of production - scary stuff.
Huh? Of course people are suggesting that we shut down fossil fuel and nuclear in favor of solar and wind. Lots of people trot out the cost of solar and compare it with the cost of nuclear and say "see, we should just go solar." That is what prompted me to post in the first place. Most nuclear plants are located near sources of cooling water. I was under the impression that is essentially necessary, but I am not an expert. As far as owning the means of production goes, well, I think it will always be more
Re: Nuclear is nice, but NOT cheaper!! (Score:2)
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Who gives a shit if Nuclear is more expensive (assuming it really is, for a moment)? It's a clean source that works and we could've been using for half a century now, like France has.Instead we spend two decades spending billions subsidizing renewables and still end up with much dirtier grid in the end.
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Its not clean, its just that the pollution (nuclear waste) is not immediate. Also, in risk assessment, the occurrence may be low, but the impact is very high. So the risk is still high. Ask the people in Fukushima how much they like nuclear.
Nuclear is deployed in 32 countries, but not cheap (Score:2)
Who gives a shit if Nuclear is more expensive (assuming it really is, for a moment)? It's a clean source that works and we could've been using for half a century now, like France has.Instead we spend two decades spending billions subsidizing renewables and still end up with much dirtier grid in the end.
You're arguing against basic economics. If what you said was true, why has NO nation achieved this glory? Of the 32 nations using nuclear power, surely one of them would have followed your common sense advice and have the cheapest electricity on the planet...and be making the news for the economic prosperity that followed. There's a HUGE incentive to generate electricity, including surplus. You can literally send electricity through the air or water to generate fuel or fertilizer. You can use electrici
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(...) why are so few new plants being built?
Simple. We're waiting for wind and PV to get such a market share that an inconveniently timed period of dunkelflaute kills a few hundred elderly during a cold spell. The actual costs of wind and PV are hidden by acting like having full peak demand capacity worth of fossil backup plants is an actual solution and, on top of that, acting like batteries could take their place (ref: OP). Those are totally unrealistic expectations and it's just a matter of time before we will learn that the hard way.
Strawman: But why isn't it cheaper? (Score:2)
(...) why are so few new plants being built?
Simple. We're waiting for wind and PV to get such a market share that an inconveniently timed period of dunkelflaute kills a few hundred elderly during a cold spell. The actual costs of wind and PV are hidden by acting like having full peak demand capacity worth of fossil backup plants is an actual solution and, on top of that, acting like batteries could take their place (ref: OP). Those are totally unrealistic expectations and it's just a matter of time before we will learn that the hard way.
PV/wind is a strawman, buddy. Why isn't nuclear cheaper? Ignore the green equation. Nuclear was promised to be cheap. If it were cheaper, people would be aggressively building nuclear power. France would have cheaper power. Russia would have a lot more than 20% nuclear power share...same as China.
China produces very little fuel domestically beyond coal. They import natural gas for power...and they'd LOVE to generate surplus electricity for industrial use, cloud-computing, even bitcoin mining. The
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> Why isn't electricity too cheap to meter in France? They have 70% nuclear power...yet their electricity costs more than ours. They also have perpetual maintenance issues for the plants, so it's not as reliable as you pretend it is.
No, that is because of politics. First is the insanity called the European electricity market. which in turn made the French legislate the Nome law, which in turn created the ARENH regulatory mechanism which stipulates that 100TWh of nuclear production must be sold to alterna
Re: They need a second life for nuclear power plan (Score:2)
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Nuclear power cost less than rooftop solar PV or offshore wind by a wide margin
Sorry but that's horseshit. Nuclear power costs far more than the most expensive forms of solar and wind even in countries run by dictator governments who don't cripple the industry with bureaucracy.
I'll read people complain on how nuclear power plants can't ramp their power output up and down quickly so therefore are worthless for power to the grid.
Literally no one has said this about nuclear power ever. Quite the opposite.
You're right we need to invest in nuclear power. BUT FUCK NO TO GIVING PLANTS A SECOND LIFE. We need to build new ones and shut down the run down, end of life, poorly designed (by modern standards) plants we have now, preferably before a
Expect these batteries recycled for a new uses (Score:1)
In molten salt nuclear fission reactors they are in need of materials like lithium, cobalt, nickel, aluminum, steel, and so much more. I would not be surprised to see old electric vehicles being use as a source of cheap high quality materials to build the next generaton of nuclear power plants.
Part of what make technologies like molten salt nuclear reactors work is the concept of "pyroprocessing". The ides is that a mix of materials becomes far more messily worked with when brought tot melting temperature
120,000 Bolt EV Batteries are where? (Score:2)