SK ecoplant and TES partner with Ecopro to establish battery recycling in Hungary

SK Ecoplant, the owner of the e-waste and battery recycling company TES, will together with TES and the South Korean cathode producer Ecopro establish a battery recycling plant in Hungary. The companies have so far not provided any details on process or capacity but has emphasised Hungary’s importance as generator of feedstock, primarily production scrap from current and planned battery plants indicating that a pre-processing plant will be a first step. The plant is planned to be completed in 2025.

EcoPro which operates a recycling plant in South Korea is currently building a cathode material plant in Debrecen, Hungary, with an annual production capacity of 108,000 tons. The aim is to start mass production in the second half of next year.

TES is building another pre-processing plant in Rotterdam in the the Netherlands with ambitions to extend the operations to material recovery.

Hungary has grown rapidly as a battery producing country with plants today operated by Samsung SDI, SK On and Yuasa. CATL is building a 100 GWh plant in Debrecen and the fellow Chinese battery companies EVE Energy and Sunwoda have announced plans to build battery production in the company.

While Samsung SDI has close connections to Sungeel Hitech which is partly owned by Samsung C&T, SK On has tightened its ties to Ecopro. Production scrap generated in the company’s plant in Georgia, USA, is pre-processed by Ascend Element which currently sell the black mass to Ecopro for further processing. Since spring 2023, Ascend Element’s largest shareholder is SK Ecoplant. This would indicate that Ascend Elements which is setting up operations in the UK and plans to expand in continental Europe also would get involved at some point.

Ecopro’s recycling technology relies to large extent on the the Chinese battery recycler GEM which is a big supplier of precursors to Ecopro and have several joint ventures with the cathode company. GEM have publicly shared their plans to establish operations in Hungary as well which we previously have been writing about but it’s not clear what activities the company plans in the country.

What’s clear is that SK Ecoplant has a clear plan to become a major player in the battery material industry, starting with strong position in recycling. Through TES and its ownership in Ascend Element the company, a business unit of the SK conglomerate, has battery recycling activities in United States, France, Germany, Netherlands, China, Australia and soon in the UK and Hungary.