As posted to the Redwood Materials YouTube page on 8/11/22

Run Time 41 minute, 15 seconds

In this clip, JB Straubel, Founder & CEO of Redwood Materials and Tesla co-founder & former CTO details how recycling lithium-ion batteries will cost effectively help EV demand & supply chain needs.  Of concern however is that legacy automotive manufacturers haven’t “done the math” on attaining the raw materials needed to produce batteries in their transition to electric vehicles, and skepticism among mining companies about the future demand of EVs and the truly massive transformation of industry necessary to transition the world to a sustainable energy economy.

JB believes that it is going to be challenging for auto makers coming into EV production a bit late. Securing enough supply of batteries and all of the components that go into them is going to be difficult.  We may see a version of the semi-conductor shortage coming in a few years as so many auto makers are ramping up their EV production.

Redwood Materials is a sustainable battery materials company.  They are working to create a closed-loop ecosystem for lithium-ion batteries.   They recycle old lithium-ion batteries of all different types . . . automotive . . . but also consumer electronics.  They take the materials out of those batteries, refine them, extract them, and then re-manufacture them into new components that can go directly into battery manufacturing.  More than 90% of the critical materials in a battery can be reused many times without degradation.  Today, the batteries we buy and put into products, have a pretty small recycled material content but this is changing fast.  People are realizing the value of having a high recycled material content, both in terms of the environmental footprint of the batteries, but also the cost of those materials.

(This is Blog Post #1260)

Redwood Materials has a mission is to build a circular supply chain to power a sustainable world and accelerate the reduction of fossil fuels.  Redwood Materials believe that this focus is critical to the future of transportation and the electric grid.