Eramet and Suez to build battery recycling plants in Dunkirk, France

The French mining company Eramet and French waste management compamy Suez have chosen the French harbour city Dunkirk as the location for a planned EVbattery recycling facility which will include facilities for dismantling and pre-processing as well as material recovery.

The final investment decision for the project is expected by the end of 2023 for

the pre-processing plant with a target start-up in 2025, and by the end of 2024 for the

material recovery plant, with a target start-up in 2027.

The pre-processing plant will be designed for an processing capacity of 50,000 tonnes of battery modules per year, which equates to around 40,000-45,000 tonnes of cells, which would be one of the biggest plants in Europe. This plant would be the main responsibility of Suez which also will take care of collection, sorting and preparation for recycling.

Eramet will be in lead for the hydrometallurgical plant which will recover and the materials in the black mass produced in the first plant and to turn this material into chemical products.

Eramet has received a grant from the European Union and the French bank BPI totaling €80 million in order to finance pre-industrialization studies, plant construction and operating costs for the first 10 years of operation.

Dunkirk and the The Hautes-de-France region has become the center of battery industrialisation in France with cell manufacturing plants being built by Prologium and Verkor in Dunkirk while ACC and Envision are building plants in Douai. Both Stellantis and Renault operates large plants in the region. Besides the project of Eramet and Suez a recycling and battery material plant is also planed by French nuclear waste specialist Orano in a joint development project with Chinese battery maker XTC.