Visualizing China’s Battery Recycling Dominance
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Visualizing China’s Battery Recycling Dominance

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Sankey chart showing China's dominant position in both the pre-treatment and refining stages of battery recycling.

Visualizing China’s Battery Recycling Dominance

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Battery recycling is expected to become a cornerstone of the global energy transition as electric vehicles (EVs) and other battery-powered technologies become more widespread.

According to exclusive data from Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, China holds a dominant position in both the pre-treatment and refining stages of battery recycling.

Chinese Growing Dominance

Battery recycling involves two major stages. First is pre-treatment, where recycling begins. Scrap batteries are typically shredded and separated to produce a material known as black mass.

The next stage is refining, which processes black mass into valuable lithium-, nickel-, and cobalt-based chemicals for use in battery cathodes.

China’s scale, infrastructure, and early investments in battery supply chains have translated into an outsized advantage in recycling capacity.

The country is expected to process 3.6 million tonnes of scrap batteries in 2025, up from 1.2 million tonnes in 2022. This would account for 78% of global pre-treatment capacity, with total global capacity projected to exceed 4.6 million tonnes.

Region/Tonnes2022202320242025P
Global1.5M2.4M2.8M4.6M
China1.2M1.8M2.1M3.6M
Asia excl. China158K231K288K361K
Europe118K133K243K416K
North America59K165K129K196K
ROW4K6K6K40K

In second place is the rest of Asia, with 361,000 tonnes, followed by Europe with 416,000 tonnes. While the U.S. attempts to reduce its reliance on China in the mineral sector, North America accounts for just 196,000 tonnes.

The refining stage is even more concentrated.

China’s black mass refining capacity is projected to nearly triple, from 895,000 tonnes in 2022 to 2.5 million tonnes by 2025—representing 89% of global capacity.

Region/Tonnes2022202320242025P
Global960K1.4M1.7M2.8M
China895K1.3M1.5M2.5M
Asia excl. China48K101K146K225K
Europe13K23K25K28K
North America4K5K5K21K
ROW01K1K32K

Refining is critical, as it converts recycled material into high-purity, battery-grade chemicals. The rest of Asia is expected to refine 225,000 tonnes, Europe 28,000 tonnes, and North America only 21,000 tonnes. Between 2022 and 2025, China’s refining capacity is projected to grow by 179%, while North America’s is expected to surge by 425%—albeit from a much smaller base.

As global demand for EVs and battery storage rises, countries looking to build domestic recycling infrastructure must accelerate investment to reduce dependence on Chinese supply chains.

Learn More on the Voronoi App 

If you enjoyed this post, be sure to check out this graphic, which forecasts the number of mines that must be developed to meet the expected demand for energy transition raw materials and chemicals by 2030.

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