What is the status and prospect of the lithium battery recycling industry?
According to the latest data, the volume of end-of-life power batteries worldwide exceeded 1 million metric tonnes in 2025. It is projected that the power battery recycling market will continue to grow at a rapid pace over the next five years, with demand for the recovery of resources such as black powder, nickel, cobalt and lithium set to rise steadily.
Lithium Battery Scrap
However, the focus of competition within the industry has shifted. Whereas the market previously focused on ‘whether recycling capacity existed’, attention is now directed more towards material recovery rates, metal purity, environmental performance indicators and unit processing costs.
SUNY GROUP’s lithium-ion battery recycling equipment enables precise resource separation
For different types of end-of-life lithium-ion batteries, SUNY GROUP offers complete equipment solutions ranging from pre-treatment to black powder recovery, suitable for the resource recovery of 18650 cylindrical batteries, pouch batteries, prismatic power batteries and consumer lithium-ion batteries.
A complete production line typically comprises a discharge system, a crushing system, magnetic separation equipment, air classification equipment, a screening system and a negative-pressure dust collection unit. For power batteries posing a risk of thermal runaway, the equipment can be configured with nitrogen protection and a low-oxygen operating system, thereby reducing safety risks whilst minimising material oxidation losses.
During the material separation stage, the equipment effectively separates copper, aluminium, separators and black powder through multi-stage crushing and fine sorting. The copper and aluminium metals can be directly recycled, whilst the black powder serves as a key raw material for the subsequent extraction of lithium, nickel, cobalt and manganese. Depending on the specific process configuration, black powder recovery rates can reach high levels, whilst effectively controlling the rate of metal contamination and improving the efficiency of subsequent hydrometallurgical processing.
Compared with traditional manual disassembly methods, automated recycling lines enable continuous operation, significantly reducing labour costs whilst improving material consistency and processing capacity, making them better suited to future large-scale battery end-of-life processing requirements.
The shift from individual machines to turnkey plant solutions is becoming an industry trend.
The future direction of the lithium-ion battery recycling industry lies not merely in expanding processing capacity, but in extending towards high-value-added resource utilisation. As the proportion of lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries continues to rise, equipment manufacturers need to develop differentiated processes tailored to different battery systems to ensure economic viability and resource utilisation efficiency.
Black Mass from Recycled Lithium Batteries
At the same time, environmental protection requirements are constantly increasing, with exhaust gas collection, dust control and automated monitoring systems becoming standard features. For recycling enterprises, selecting suppliers with comprehensive process design and equipment integration capabilities will offer greater long-term value than simply pursuing low-cost equipment.
Finally, from the perspective of the industry’s development cycle, the coming years will represent a crucial window of opportunity for the expansion of global lithium-ion battery recycling capacity, and recycling equipment characterised by automation, modularity and high recovery efficiency will become vital infrastructure for driving industrial upgrading. If you are interested in or require lithium-ion battery recycling services, please feel free to contact us at any time for further information.
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