Focus on sustainability: Münster University of Applied Sciences and RWTH Aachen University develop concept for battery recycling center.
The market for e-mobility is growing steadily. According to the Federal Motor Transport Authority (KBA), 194,000 purely battery-electric passenger cars were newly registered in 2020, an increase of 206 percent compared to the previous year. At 49 percent, almost half of all new registrations were battery-powered cars.
But more e-cars, e-bikes and e-scooters also mean more high-performance batteries that have to be recycled at great expense – a process that is also often associated with heavy environmental impact. The Resources Working Group at the Institute for Infrastructure – Water – Resources – Environment at Münster University of Applied Sciences (IWARU) has set itself the task of finding innovative solutions in this field.
Together with RWTH Aachen University, IWARU has developed a concept for a recycling center. "The aim of the demonstration center for battery recycling is to close as complete a cycle as possible for the total material flow of batteries and thus secure sustainable e-mobility," explains Sabine Flamme, who teaches and conducts research on resources, material flow and infrastructure management at the Department of Civil Engineering at Münster University of Applied Sciences. The project is part of the "Battery Recycling Demonstration Center" study funded by the state of NRW.
