Toyota pairs with Redwood for EV batteries

As part of its commitment to reduce its environmental footprint and achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, Toyota Motor North America is collaborating with Redwood Materials Inc. to create a sustainable, closed-loop battery ecosystem for its electrified powertrains.

Toward this goal, Toyota and Redwood will explore a series of end-of-life battery solutions for Toyota's proposed battery ecosystem.

The mission focuses not only on the collection, testing, and recycling of batteries into raw materials to create a sustainable supply chain but also aims to develop second-life opportunities for remanufactured and repurposed Toyota hybrid electric vehicle batteries by leveraging battery health screening tools and valuable data from its vehicles.

"We are excited to be working with Redwood Materials to identify solutions for our electrified powertrains at the end-of-life that contributes to our vision of creating a sustainable, circular battery ecosystem," said Christopher Yang, group vice president of business development at Toyota North America. "We are committed to developing sustainable solutions that allow our batteries to provide value beyond the initial lifecycle in an electrified vehicle. This also contributes to our carbon neutrality goals and our mission to build a more sustainable world for all."

Established in 2017 by Tesla co-founder JB Straubel, Redwood Materials has rapidly climbed to a valuation of $3.8 billion as of September.

With an innovator behind the company that kicked off the electric vehicle frenzy, Redwood's goal is to recover lithium battery materials from the waste thrown away or no longer in use in an effort to capture the inestimable value of urban mining. This will position Redwood to be ready for the influx of batteries to recycle as early generations of EVs reach the end of their life.

You can read about Redwood Materials and its lithium battery recycling efforts at The American giant of battery recycling in the February 9, 2022, edition of Metal Tech News.

Now, Redwood is working with Toyota, which has been selling Prius hybrid vehicles for more than two decades.

"Toyota helped pave the way for clean transportation with the introduction of the Toyota Prius more than 20 years ago," said Redwood Materials CEO JB Straubel. "Their commitment not only to sell millions of electrified vehicles this decade but to ensure their circularity into the future is a critical step for electrification."

Redwood hopes to drive down the environmental footprint and cost of lithium-ion batteries by offering large-scale sources of domestic anode and cathode materials produced from recycled batteries.

As the company receives more than six gigawatt-hours of end-of-life batteries annually for recycling, which are then refined and remanufactured into critical battery materials, Redwood plans to ramp the production of anode and cathode components in the U.S. to 100 GWh annually by 2025 – enough to make more than one million electric vehicles a year.

Together, Toyota and Redwood will explore ways to seamlessly incorporate battery recycling through domestic battery materials manufacturing into Toyota's battery production strategy, beginning with North America.

You can read about Toyota's roadmap of EV investment in the US at Toyota to invest $3.4 billion for US EV in the October 21, 2022, edition of Metal Tech News.

"Redwood and Toyota's shared vision to drive down the environmental footprint and cost of transportation will continue to accelerate the adoption and access to electric vehicles," added Straubel.

Toyota's production plans include new and increased automotive battery production in the United States, with the company recently announcing an investment of $1.29 billion in a new North American battery plant, Toyota Battery Manufacturing, North Carolina (TBMNC).

When completed, TBMNC is projected to produce battery packs for 1.2 million electrified vehicles per year. Additionally, the company expects to sell roughly eight million electrified vehicles globally by 2030 and invest approximately $70 billion toward this development.