Lead battery recycling firm Recyclus has been issued a permit to treat and process lead-acid batteries at its Tipton Recycling Site in the UK.
The permit will allow Recyclus to fit a hazardous waste installation, which is primarily used in the treatment and processing of lead-acid batteries on-site and provides the legal foundation to complete the sub-licences that will enable operations to begin at Tipton.
Recyclus, which is 49% owned by UK firm Technology Minerals, aims to increase its lead-acid battery recycling production capacity from around 16,000 tonnes in the first full year of production, to as much as 80,000 tonnes by 2027.
The Tipton plant is designed to process up to 12 tonnes an hour of lead-acid batteries and has a fully automated system.
In addition, Recyclus has successfully completed stage one of the audit process for ISO 9001, 14001 and 45001 certifications, a global standard for Quality, Environmental and Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems.
Recyclus will now proceed to the final stage and, subject to successfully completing the audit process, will be certified.
Optimistic battery plans
Last September, Recyclus Group announced plans to open five plants, each capable of processing 12 tonnes of lead-acid batteries per-hour, within ten years.
The plans began with the delivery of a breaker from Brazil to “industrialise what is traditionally a labour intensive market”.
Each of the planned plants will be tasked with producing 16,000 tonnes of lead paste per year.
At the time, Recyclus said it would source used batteries from the UK and put through three phases: comminution, density separation, and a hydrometallurgical method to produce lead paste.
However, the UK only collected 7,573 tonnes of lead batteries during the first two quarters of 2021, according to figures published by the Environment Agency on the National Packaging Waste Database.
A Recyclus spokesman told BEST: “The ambition of building up to 80,000 tonnes processing capacity by 2027 is to target the expected increase in demand to recycle end of life lead-acid batteries.
“At this stage, Recyclus is unable to name any potential future clients and sources, given the commercial sensitivity of doing so, but the strategy will be to build up capacity to meet the demand over the coming years.”
