The question in the title of this article of a bigger one than many people realize. Most of us are familiar with the slightly fussy business of recycling batteries, and it might seem that to make batteries more sustainable is a simple matter of adopting these habits and being sure to carry them out assiduously. After all, batteries are essentially a hazardous cocktail of chemicals and metals that certainly cannot be disposed of the same fashion as most other recyclable products.
Yet as complicated as battery recycling can be, this is not the real reason that sustainability in the manufacture and use of batteries is such a fraught issue. The real challenge that awaits the world is not squaring our current level of battery use with environmental targets. Instead, it is preparing for the changes that are already occurring within the battery industry. Forget our current level of battery use, batteries are only going to become more widespread in coming decades – on account of several factors – and the real challenge will be embracing this “battery-powered future” and doing so in such a way that the impact on the environment from battery manufacture and use does not sky-rocket. And even the latest battery products have some downsides where sustainability is concerned.
The Lithium-ion Paradox
The development of the lithium-ion battery well illustrates this particular paradox. Lithium-ion batteries were first developed in the early nineties and, ever since then, their use has expanded into rechargeable smart battery technology, finding its biggest application inside portable electronic devices such as smartphones and laptops. The problem with lithium-ion, however, is that the mining of lithium and the manufacture of these batteries is far from a particularly sustainable process. The mining of lithium, in particular, is known for being particularly hazardous for local eco-systems and has even been said to cause localized droughts.
The paradox arises because lithium-ion batteries are supposed to be a clean solution to traditional batteries. For one thing, the massively increased charge capacity which lithium-ion offers allows for highly efficient rechargeable batteries. USB rechargeable smart batteries produced by Utah-based company Pale Blue Earth, for example, can sustain nearly a thousand full charge cycles before disposal is necessary. This certainly has its environmental benefits – all made possible by lithium-ion technology.
But of course, the disposal of lithium-ion batteries is still a fraught issue. The paradox can be even more sharply felt when you consider that lithium-ion is the power source of choice for the electric cars that are set to completely take over within a couple of decades. A world of electric cars is certainly good for the environment but producing that many will necessitate lithium-ion battery production on a truly unprecedented scale – and we have seen that this is not the most environmentally friendly process. Thus, we have the roll out of a technology, which is all about sustainability, necessitating industrial processes that are not sustainable at all. For some perspective, lithium-ion batteries are only about 5% recyclable; the lead-acid batteries in cars, which they are set to replace, are 99% recyclable.
Solution
So how can we embrace all the new eco-friendly technology that batteries make possible without negatively offsetting that with a whole new program of environmental damage? Ultimately, that might be a question for the scientists, but we can still do a lot to help. On balance, rechargeable batteries – especially newer super-efficient ones – do amount to less environmental damage than simply throwing away disposables all the time. Perhaps it is little decisions like that which will help ease along this difficult transition.
