Pohang City Launches Korea's First 'Battery Recycling' Project in Full Scale

Completion of Secondary Battery Integrated Management Center ... Stepping Stone for Regional Economic Revitalization

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Dongguk Lee] Pohang City has completed the construction of the Secondary Battery Comprehensive Management Center, establishing a foundation to become a sustainable battery-centered city and playing a pivotal role in the development of the K-battery industry.

Designated as a regulatory-free special zone for 'Next-Generation Battery Recycling' in July 2019, Pohang City is establishing its status as a future secondary battery technology development and manufacturing innovation hub city, striving to secure leadership as South Korea's top battery industry leading city.

On the 13th, Pohang City held the completion ceremony for the Secondary Battery Comprehensive Management Center, the first outcome of the recycling project, at the Blue Valley National Industrial Complex and began full-scale operations.

The newly completed Secondary Battery Comprehensive Management Center was constructed with a project cost of 10.7 billion KRW (2.7 billion KRW from provincial funds, 8 billion KRW from city funds), started construction in December 2020, and consists of three above-ground floors with a total floor area of 3,549㎡, housing battery storage, research facilities, and reliability evaluation facilities.

The Secondary Battery Comprehensive Management Center plans to establish standards for the secondary battery recycling industry through performance evaluation of electric vehicle batteries and comprehensive management technology research and development.

The Comprehensive Management Center serves as a hub collection center for used batteries in the Daegu-Gyeongbuk area, leases office space at low cost to battery-related startups and small and medium enterprises to encourage new product development, and provides an open experimental space (Test-Bed) reflecting various battery usage environments to companies.

Based on being selected as an excellent special zone nationwide for two consecutive years, Pohang City has attracted large-scale investments totaling approximately 3.2 trillion KRW from companies such as EcoPro, POSCO Chemical, and GS Construction to foster the secondary battery industry as a future new growth engine industry.

In May, Pohang was selected as the optimal site for the Ministry of Environment's used battery resource circulation cluster (national fund competition, worth 50 billion KRW), and plans to establish research support complexes and enterprise clusters within the Blue Valley National Industrial Complex and Yeongilman General Industrial Complex.

Mayor Kang-deok Lee emphasized, "Over the past seven years, Pohang City has devoted all its efforts to discovering and fostering new growth industries for industrial structure diversification, achieving visible results in new industries such as secondary batteries, bio, and hydrogen."

He added, "Especially with the completion of the Secondary Battery Comprehensive Management Center, we will accelerate the development of the used battery industry and, through government support linkage, focus on advancing as a battery industry-centered city by establishing a super-gap foundation for the secondary battery industry, including the clustering of secondary battery material companies."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.