E-MOBILITY
Cell Cycle is currently working to scale up its pilot patented biotechnology recycling process
Cell Cycle’s bacteria is grown, cultivated and regenerated in-house BACTERIA
ithium batteries have played a crucial role in everything from mobile phones, laptops and PCs to electric vehicle
(EV) batteries. As such, the need to efficiently and sustainably recycling these batteries once they reach end of life is growing exponentially. With a ‘tsunami of batteries’ predicted to flood recycling centres in the next few years, Max Nagle of Cell Cycle – part of the SER Group - believes the company’s innovative battery treatment technology will prove vital in meeting this demand. “Right now, there is no refining
capability in the UK for the battery recycling industry, so we have to rely on our networks abroad to provide the
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been used to treat mines, whether that’s directly or indirectly, to break
BIOTECHNOLOGY L
Could million-year- old bacteria prove the silver bullet for modern day lithium battery recycling?
entire battery recycling process,” he explains. “When we launched Cell Cycle, we worked diligently within the first six months to build a very large and expansive network, meaning we had a sustainable recycling route for any type of battery chemistry you can think of that’s on the market right now.” Bringing the entire closed-loop
battery recycling process to the UK could now be made possible by Cell Cycle’s innovative recycling technology, LithiumCycle, which uses engineered bacteria to treat and break down a battery in order to recover its precious metals and materials. “For over 50 years, bacteria have
down materials and produce different metallurgies,” Nagle says. “In the purification of water, bacteria can produce enzymes that help to purify it and ingest impurities that would normally harm human health. More recently, bacteria have been used to treat electronics. A motherboard contains up to 60 different elements, if you shred and treat that with a certain type of engineered bacteria you can recover the platinum, palladium, gold, copper, and all those other critical and valuable materials to then sell back into the industry.” Despite their track record, one
area that bacteria have not been applied to until now is batteries, Nagle continues: “There’s all this knowledge,
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