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The Powerful Possibilities of Recycling the World’s Batteries | Emma Nehrenheim | TED

The world has plenty of clean energy. The problem is storing that energy and getting it where we need it, when we need it, says battery recycling pioneer Emma Nehrenheim. While batteries are fundamental to powering a sustainable future, their production is surprisingly harsh on the environment. She lays out the science behind a breakthrough…

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The world has plenty of clean energy. The problem is storing that energy and getting it where we need it, when we need it, says battery recycling pioneer Emma Nehrenheim. While batteries are fundamental to powering a sustainable future, their production is surprisingly harsh on the environment. She lays out the science behind a breakthrough in recycling a battery’s core elements, offering a manufacturing solution that could vastly reduce the industry’s environmental impact and demand for new materials from mining.

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39 Comments

39 Comments

  1. Johnny blaze

    November 3, 2023 at 11:42 am

    First

    • Alexandru Gheorghe

      November 3, 2023 at 12:41 pm

      Indeed.

  2. Taki Elddine

    November 3, 2023 at 11:42 am

    Great

  3. 062 Sanzida Suma

    November 3, 2023 at 11:43 am

    Yes

  4. RF XYZ

    November 3, 2023 at 11:43 am

    From Bangladesh 🇧🇩

  5. 062 Sanzida Suma

    November 3, 2023 at 11:47 am

    I know scientific information

  6. Barlowjmb

    November 3, 2023 at 11:47 am

    I throw all my batteries into the ocean, for the eels.

    I’m doing my part!

  7. Lee Jagger

    November 3, 2023 at 11:59 am

    I hope that Elon musk jumps on this bandwagon. There are so many dead Tesla batteries that they don’t know what to do with yet.

    • webcabbage

      November 4, 2023 at 5:14 pm

      Look up redwood materials

  8. Anthonie Weyland

    November 3, 2023 at 12:08 pm

    So another Redwood Materials, good to know more company’s are getting involved. 🔋♻️

  9. spookycanuck1

    November 3, 2023 at 12:12 pm

    And just two days ago two battery recycling plants in Canada shut down. Another reason why we are not ready for widespread adoption of EVs. It’s going to cost billions, if not trillions, to prepare our electric grids over the next decade or two.

    • Ziploc

      November 3, 2023 at 3:11 pm

      Boo hoo hoo, we are not ready for new technology because we didn’t prepare. That’s not a good reason to not prepare.

    • Linus Holmgren

      November 5, 2023 at 4:23 pm

      But like one month earlier Northvolt (the company she is working for) announced they will be opening their own factory in Canada

  10. 34TM3 Gaming

    November 3, 2023 at 12:13 pm

    She is absolutely right. Fossil fuels is already killing our planet. We need to do things safely for the advancement of clean energy. ❤

    • Akira

      November 3, 2023 at 1:43 pm

      But almost everything is made from fossil fuel. I don’t it’s even possible to have clean energy w/o fossil fuels which defeats the purpose lol

  11. greeny

    November 3, 2023 at 12:15 pm

    Y’all gotta take that Sue Klebold talk down straight up a delusional woman playing victim and hiding from accountability. That talk is not intellectual in any way and it’s not educational, it’s the opposite. It’s manipulating the truth and the past to avoid responsibility, and its disrespect to the victims. Right your own wrongs and take the damn talk down.

  12. Wayne Alan

    November 3, 2023 at 12:51 pm

    There is no climate or environmental crisis. Next.

    • FerRR

      November 3, 2023 at 3:30 pm

      Wait till bread hits 20 bucks a loaf, you’ll see where your belief stands then.

    • Wayne Alan

      November 3, 2023 at 3:49 pm

      @FerRR that’s a crisis of government corruption.

  13. Dame Anvil

    November 3, 2023 at 1:11 pm

    00:08 🌍 Batteries play a crucial role in enabling the use of clean energy by allowing its storage and transportation.
    01:09 ⛏ Historically, we have extracted resources like oil without considering long-term consequences, contributing to environmental crises.
    02:10 🏭 Battery manufacturing consumes large amounts of energy and relies on global mining, refining, and complex supply chains.
    03:44 🔄 Putting battery manufacturing under a renewable energy grid significantly reduces its carbon footprint, but challenges remain in the supply chain.
    04:45 🌿 Sustainable mining and recycling can greatly reduce the environmental impact of battery production.
    05:42 ♻ A recycling process can recover materials from used batteries, creating a circular battery economy.
    07:44 ⚙ The circular economy approach should be extended to other industries, such as wind turbines and solar panels, for a sustainable transformation.
    08:39 💰 Implementing recycling and traceability systems is not only environmentally beneficial but also economically profitable, as materials retain their value over time.

    • Ziploc

      November 3, 2023 at 3:13 pm

      Nailed it, and when you start with a old battery you already have all the resources needed to make a new one. Batteries, solar panels etc can be recycled, we just aren’t up to speed with the infrastructure to do it.

  14. MaPowey

    November 3, 2023 at 1:23 pm

    this is the first time ive clicked on a ted talk in a while. seems actually important for once. she seemed a little nervous (who care’s though) but the content of the speech was great.

  15. MM D807

    November 3, 2023 at 2:14 pm

    👍👍👍👍👍👍❤

  16. MM D807

    November 3, 2023 at 2:20 pm

    Right – burned fossil is lost forever!!! It is in the atmosphere- no Chance too recycle it like Akkus 🔋

  17. Andy Cordy

    November 3, 2023 at 2:34 pm

    Bring on the black mass!

  18. Freddie Vee

    November 3, 2023 at 4:04 pm

    As long as slave labor is used to mine the minerals needed to make batteries, recycling will not be economically feasible.

  19. WB159

    November 3, 2023 at 7:50 pm

    Amazing! We are building shredder for all kinds of material. I think we should concentrate more on batteries

  20. Toby O'Hara

    November 3, 2023 at 11:02 pm

    This is a very important message, I’m glad we are talking about it. I hope we also start to implement mechanical batteries, which will ease pressure on mining. Mechanical batteries include, weights and pulley, pumped air, pumped hydro, flywheel, and springs.

  21. anil kumar Patel

    November 4, 2023 at 4:04 am

  22. Hải Nguyên Land Nha Trang

    November 4, 2023 at 5:42 am

    Its a great speech, many thanks 🙂

  23. Garo Gary Voskorian

    November 4, 2023 at 8:41 am

    What’s killing our planet is not the CO2 emission.

    People in this civilization they’re killing themselves

  24. Samuel Zev

    November 4, 2023 at 8:56 am

    Battery recycling is already done by some companies but it hasn’t been done in large scale by everyone because it is costly and that it’s not being funded properly by the government and also soecial interest groups like oil companies feed false information to the poorly educated to think that it is not possible when in fact it is. Take a look at conservatives in the US, they believe that windmills and other renewables can’t power a country but norway and Iceland proved them wrong because they are nearly renewable powered

  25. FXPear Studio

    November 4, 2023 at 1:23 pm

    We are going to “mine” the ocean floor to keep up with battery demands. Finally killing our survival in long term.

  26. Adigerla Prasad

    November 4, 2023 at 10:21 pm

    👌👌👌🙏💐💐💐🇮🇳

  27. Jim Baker

    November 5, 2023 at 8:35 am

    People tend to gloss over areas they shouldn’t gloss over in their pursuit of a pushing an idea. In this case the idea is how its great to have batteries and run the world on electricity. The elephant in the room is how are we going to generate the electricity to power all these vehicles. The fact is that the electrical grids can not handle running the world on electric cars. And more electric cars means more oil, and coal burning.

    • Jimmy

      November 5, 2023 at 9:15 am

      We’ll have to downsize significantly

  28. Stefan Albu

    November 6, 2023 at 1:50 am

    What’s the hurry womaaan? What’s the hurry? Beeeee theere……..You The GIRL

  29. Nauce_key_randomized

    November 6, 2023 at 6:21 pm

    😊😊😊

  30. cybersekkin

    November 7, 2023 at 5:22 pm

    No recycle opperation is terribly efficient. Materials get degraded as they are mixed with impurities. I guess well have to make due until molecular sorters can get invented.

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