ENVIRONMENT
INGENIEUR
Second Life EV Batteries : A Sustainable and Cost- Effective Energy Storage System
By Mohammad Hussein Saleh Mohammed Haram Lee Jia Woon Ir . Siva Priya Thiagarajah Ir . Assoc . Prof . Dr Gobbi Ramasam Dr Ngu Eng Eng Centre for Electric Energy and Automation Faculty of Engineering , Multimedia University
Ir . Lee Yuen How Light and Energy Sdn Bhd
Once the batteries for Electric Vehicles ( EVs )
degrade to about 70-80 % of their initial capacity after about five to eight years of operation , they will need to be replaced as they can no longer satisfy the long driving range and performance needed by EVs . Because of this , the amount of discarded batteries will eventually become very large . Nowadays , there is a rising concern as discarded batteries are harmful to the environment if they are not handled properly . It is estimated that by 2030 , sales of EVs will reach 85 million globally , resulting in a huge amount of discarded batteries which are expected to reach a total of 1000GWh of equivalent storage ( Gohla- Neudecker , Bowler , and Mohr 2015 ; Hossain et al . 2019 ; Martinez-Laserna et al . 2018 ).
It is further estimated that the demand for batteries will increase 14 times by 2030 compared to 2018 ; whereby the EV application is dominating the demand by more than 88 % compared to other applications , such as Energy Storage Systems ( ESSs ) and Consumer Electronics ( CE ). On the other hand , China is leading the demand in the battery market by
Figure 1 : Accumulative second life battery capacity and EV sales by 2030
more than 42.7 %, followed by 16.9 % for the European Union ( EU ), 13.6 % for the United States ( US ), and 26.8 % for the Rest of the World ( RoW ) ( World Economic Forum 2019 ).
However , these batteries could be re-used in other applications , such as in stationary ESSs . Reusing discarded EV batteries in other applications is known as Second Life EV Batteries ( SLB ). Utilising SLB could create huge financial opportunities for
70 VOL 85 JANUARY - MARCH 2021