With auctions of critical mineral blocks in India having met with a lukewarm response, will recyclers prove to be a crucial set of urban miners who will help meet the demand for cobalt, lithium, and nickel in the country? 

It is learnt that a legislation is in the pipeline to address the serious shortage of critical minerals for the manufacture of Lithium ion (Li-ion) batteries and other electronic devices. In all likelihood, the move will take the form of a productivity linked investment (PLI) scheme for the recycling of critical minerals in the country. This will help to create a circular economy and give a fresh incentive to recyclers to extract the maximum secondary metals from end-of-life lithium-ion batteries.  

The Global E-waste Monitor 2024 has cited figures which should serve as an eye-opener. In 2022, as much as 900 million primary ore extraction from the earth was avoided globally by reclaiming materials through documented recycling. The value of metals embedded in 2022 e-waste included $19 billion worth of copper, $15 billion in gold and $16 billion in iron. The value of secondary raw materials reclaimed from e-waste was $28 billion. In addition to this, 93 million tonnes of CO2 emissions were avoided by formal e-waste management. And all this, when only 23 per cent of the global e-waste was formally recycled.  

PLI scheme

Closer home, India’s PLI scheme may well boost the extraction from end-of-life batteries and reduce its need to import critical minerals. “India does not have reserves of critical minerals, and this is a step in the right direction. Why pay taxpayers money for importing?” says Nitin Gupta, CEO and Co-founder at electronic waste and battery recycling company, Attero. 

He feels recycling as a methodology has a larger agenda and that incentives should be given to companies that have good efficiency and a rate of extraction that is 90 per cent or so. Attero’s patented technology gives it an extraction efficiency of 98 per cent. “The companies must be technologically advanced and be able to match the top quality. Besides, those who have developed the extraction technology in India must be given more brownie points,” he says. 

Energy-efficient extraction

Bengaluru-based MiniMines, a fledgling start-up, is one that has also developed its own technology. The founders Anupam Kumar and Arvind Bhardwaj hope that with an extraction efficiency of 96 per cent, they too will be covered. “We have developed a water and energy-efficient hybrid hydrometallurgy process to extract rare metals like lithium, cobalt, nickel and manganese from Li-ion battery waste. We have developed the technology from scratch and have taken it from lab unit to pilot unit and have been evaluated by Oil India Ltd and the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO). We hope small players like us who cannot match the financials of large companies but have the efficiency also get a chance,” they say.  

“If companies are required to provide balance sheets for many years and show massive investments, we will not be able to fulfil the criteria. The incentive scheme should be fair to all of us,” says Kumar hoping seed fund companies are also covered under the scheme. 

MiniMines recently received a grant of $100,000 from ACT, a non-profit Indian venture philanthropy platform which is supporting ground-breaking, cutting-edge clean tech solutions and helping start-ups scale up. “We apply venture capital principles to our grants and our investment committee does strict evaluation and due diligence before awarding a grant, says Alankrita Khera, Director ACT, making a case for MiniMines.  

Meanwhile, experts feel that besides a PLI scheme, it would be pertinent for the government to consider mandating EV battery manufacturers under its Battery Waste Management Rules to use a percentage of secondary raw minerals in their new batteries and incentivise them for the same. This would be a further boost for recyclers and ensure that critical minerals extracted in India do not find their way into other countries, while India imports raw material. That would, no doubt, be a prudent move.

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