Elkem to spin out graphite manufacturing – and recycling

The Norwegian material company Elkem, one of the world's leading providers of silicones, silicon products and carbon solutions has established a separate unit for its anode business. The new unit, named Vianode, will be a fully-owned subsidiary of Elkem and Elkem's existing activities in advanced battery materials will become part of the new company.

In a statement Elkem says it is currently inviting external industrial and financial partners to participate in the business.

Besides the fact that Vianode will be one of few newly established European battery material companies with expertise and resources to achieve a significant scale, it is of note that the company has for some years been deeply involved in R&D around the recycling of battery-grade graphite, something that largely has been overlooked in today's recycling. There are Chinese recyclers of graphite and Australian Ecograf has launched a process which is used by Korean Sungeel Hitech which now will be implemented in Sungeel's recycling plants in Hungary and South Korea. In Poland the recycling company Royal Bee recover graphite from anode scrap from battery production scrap.

What's interesting with Vianodes recycling process is that it is the first process in Europe which will be developed by a producer of anode material with both the capability and channels to sell it back to the battery value chain.

Read more about Vianode here.