Volvo Buses to deliver batteries to Envirostream in Australia

Envirostream, a wholly owned subsidiary of Lithium Australia, has signed an exclusive agreement with the Buses business arm of Volvo Group Australia to recycle end-of-life lithium-ion batteries from its electric and hybrid bus fleet in Australia. The agreement has an initial 3-year term.

Volvo is now to supply used batteries from its buses in Australia to Envirostream where the recycling subsidiary of Lithium Australia is to recycle them. Volvo manufactures and supplies electric and hybrid buses to transport operators across Australia, including the public transport authority in Western Australia – where Lithium Australia is based – and Transdev in Queensland.

While Lithium Australia did not mention second life use of Volvo bus batteries for stationary storage applications before recycling, the Western Australian company does state in the announcement with Volvo buses that “Partnering with top tier EV and ESS manufacturers is a core part of Lithium Australia’s national growth strategy.” In the UK, Volvo Group announced it was aiming to reutilise electric truck and bus batteries with Connected Energy for second-life stationary storage applications.

Lithium Australia managing director and chief executive officer Simon Linge said, “The agreement validates our strategy to target large-scale OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) and ESS (energy storage systems) manufacturers to grow our share of the high margin, large-format battery collection volumes.”

Linge projected that “Increasing our capability and growing volumes are strong drivers for the Company reaching cashflow breakeven within the recycling business, which we aim to achieve in the near term.”

In March this year, Envirostream signed an updated agreement with South Korean manufacturer LG Energy Solution.

lithium-au.com