Li-Cycle And Glencore Speed Up Plans For European Recycling Hub

Li-Cycle Holdings Corp LICY and Glencore International AG, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Glencore plc GLCNF, have unveiled plans for a two-phase approach to the Portovesme Hub project in Sardinia, Italy, to expedite the production of battery-grade lithium carbonate.

Li-Cycle is a lithium-ion battery resource recovery company, and Glencore is a producer, recycler, and marketer of nickel and cobalt.

Phase 1 is designed to process up to 11,000 tonnes of black mass annually and is expected to start operations in the first half of 2024.

The phase will help boost the recovery of lithium carbonate and strengthen Li-Cycle's first-mover advantage in Europe. 

Phase 1 project is expected to produce up to 1,500 tonnes of lithium carbonate, as well as up to 3,000 tonnes of contained nickel and up to 500 tonnes of contained cobalt per year.

The company expects the Phase 2 facility to have 50,000 to 70,000 tonnes of black mass processing capacity, and to produce up to 16,500 tonnes of lithium carbonate, as well as up to 18,000 tonnes of contained nickel and 2,250 tonnes of contained cobalt per year.

The Portovesme Hub is being designed to be able to process all forms of lithium-ion based black mass, including lithium iron phosphate (LFP) materials.

The black mass processed at Phase 1 and Phase 2 is expected to be supplied from Li-Cycle's European Spoke recycling network and Glencore's commercial network. 

Both phases will utilize existing infrastructure and equipment at Glencore's existing Portovesme metallurgical complex and leverage Li-Cycle's hydrometallurgical process to produce critical battery materials, including nickel, cobalt and lithium, from recycled battery content.

The full-scale Phase 2 Portovesme Hub is expected to advance to construction and begin commissioning in late 2026 to early 2027.

"We are excited to accelerate our plans with Glencore to establish clean, post-processing refining capacity for recycled lithium-ion batteries in Europe," said Li-Cycle's Executive Chair and co-founder Tim Johnston.

Also Read: Li-Cycle Inks Battery Recycling MoU With EVE Energy

Price Action: LICY shares are trading higher by 0.26% at $4.36 in premarket on the last check Monday.