Revolt One, which will be called the recycling factory, will be located adjacent to the battery factory in Skellefteå.
- There are many points with it, states Emma Nehrenheim who is environmental manager at Northvolt and head of Revolt One.
The company has used the term "mining in your own backyard" to describe the effort to create a cycle for a part of the electric car that has a major environmental impact: the battery.
- An old battery contains exactly the metals that a new battery needs and by building a recycling here we can use what is left over in production but also bring in materials from the market and make new batteries, she says.
Here, through a so-called hydrometallurgical process, graphite and pure metals such as nickel, cobalt, manganese and lithium must be separated in many steps, so that the material can be used again.
- I am proud of what we manage to achieve together, says Emma Nehrenheim.
More recycling as time goes on
Many texts have been written about the difficulties of recycling, not least lithium.
Among other things, it has been about being expensive.
The method to be used in Skellefteå has been developed by researchers at Chalmers in Gothenburg and developed in Västerås, and it will mean that up to 95 percent of the metals in old batteries can be reused.
- When we start up the factory at the end of next year, it is important to scale up at the right pace, says Emma Nehrenheim.
You can see in the clip how much is to be recycled and what the challenges are.