• Two plants to be built in China, one for pretreatment (Nanjing) and the other for post-processing (Quzhou) 
• The JV to reinforce LGES’s drive for closed-loop system and promote its cost-competitiveness in securing key battery raw materials

LG Energy Solution (LGES; KRX: 373220) announced the establishment of its first battery recycling joint venture (JV) with Zhejiang Huayou Recycling Technology Co., Ltd (hereinafter referred to as “Huayou Recycling”), a subsidiary of Huayou Cobalt.

LGES and Huayou Recycling signed the JV establishment agreement at Huayou Cobalt’s Tongxiang headquarters in China on August 7, with the attendance of Dongsoo Kim, Senior Vice President of Procurement Center at LGES; Xuehua Chen, Chairman of Huayou Cobalt; and Wei Bao, General Manager of Huayou Recycling.

The new JV will oversee the construction of two battery recycling plants in China—a pretreatment plant in Nanjing, where LGES is currently operating its battery production facility, and a post-processing plant in Quzhou, a strategic location to utilize Huayou Cobalt’s pre-existing infrastructure.

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Once the production starts in late 2024, battery scrap generated from LGES Nanjing facility, as well as waste batteries collected by Huayou Recycling, will be delivered to the joint venture company to produce recycled metals, including nickel, cobalt and lithium, which will be processed and supplied back to the LGES Nanjing plant.

Through the JV, LGES will ensure a stable supply of waste batteries and battery scraps that are vital to the company’s initiative toward establishing an integrated closed-loop manufacturing system, and further strengthen its competitive edges in securing key battery raw materials.

LGES will also reinforce its cost-competitiveness by increasing the amount of retrieved metals through adopting new techniques, as well as cutting back recycling costs. In addition, by situating both the pre-treatment and post-processing facilities in proximity to its Nanjing plant, LGES will be able to establish more solid closed-loop recycling system in China.

Establishing a closed-loop system of battery manufacturing is a key priority task for LGES in realizing its ESG vision. The company is proactively implementing ESG-related practices, such as reusing or recycling end-of-life batteries and managing waste generated at its business sites. In China, LGES has already completed the establishment of recycling system at its Nanjing facility in 2022. Globally, the company has secured strategic partnerships with leading recyclers to establish end-of-life batteries collection system.