Segiritec Transfers 'Electric Vehicle Waste Battery Rare Metal Separation Process' Technology... "First Domestic Entry into LFP Recycling"

Segiritec, a 100% subsidiary of KPS and a specialized company in lead-acid battery recycling, is starting an electric vehicle battery (NCM·LFP) recycling business. They plan to receive solvent extraction process technology for extracting rare metals from secondary battery waste batteries and operate a pilot process by the end of the year.

According to KPS, Segiritec has signed a technology transfer and commercialization agreement with a government-funded research institute that holds numerous original technologies for waste battery recycling and reuse, and they will jointly advance the 'low-cost high-purity' solvent extraction process.

Starting this month, Segiritec will sequentially receive intellectual property rights (patent technology name: multi-stage solvent extraction monitoring system) and know-how (rare metal separation process design and operation) developed and held by the research institute.

In particular, Segiritec and the research institute plan to maximize synergy effects in the lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery recycling business, which will be attempted for the first time in Korea.

The research institute will actively provide technical data related to LFP series secondary battery recycling, and Segiritec will utilize technology that can effectively recover lithium battery materials in the pretreatment stage (patent technology name: method for separating battery materials and recycled materials obtained by this method).

Segiritec explained that from the end of this year, when the technology transfer is underway, they will operate an LFP series pilot plant and build the first plant for recovering rare metals from electric vehicle waste batteries of the NCM series, which can be commercialized by the end of next year.

Kim Minhong, CEO of Segiritec, emphasized, "Our technology involves increasing material recovery rates at the battery cell stage using chemical reactions without physical or thermal shocks, and it can be applied not only to nickel-cobalt-manganese (NCM) series batteries but also expanded to LFP recycling. Since we are jointly promoting recycling commercialization with a government-funded research institute, we will accelerate the establishment of an optimal commercialization system."

Meanwhile, since 2010, Segiritec has been producing battery raw materials (ingots), essential for the automotive industry, by recycling waste batteries and waste lead, supplying them to domestic and international battery manufacturers. Last year, their sales and operating profit were 86.5 billion KRW and 5.8 billion KRW respectively, with a net profit of 4.275 billion KRW. The operating profit increased by 37% compared to the previous year.

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