The world is moving towards an electric future: by the end of 2024, there will be 57 million electric cars on the road, according to estimates. This growth not only transforms our streets, but also opens up an opportunity: what happens to batteries that are no longer useful in cars?

A Canadian company has the solution: reuse them to store and produce energy.

Reusing. Moment Enegry is a Canadian startup that came to the fore a while ago thanks to a collaboration with Mercedes-Benz Energy. According to For both companies, when an electric car battery is removed, it still retains 80% – on average – of its original capacity. It is not suitable for road vehicles, but it can still be used for other purposes and what Moment Energy was doing was creating a 60 kWh energy storage system thanks to those batteries.

Gigafactory. The company’s intention is to continue expanding its battery reuse system, and they have just received strong support. The U.S. Department of Energy has awarded a grant of more than $20 million for Moment Energy to open the first electric vehicle battery reuse plant in the country.

It will be located in Taylor, Texas, and they claim that it will be a next-generation gigafactory that will produce “safe and affordable energy systems from reused batteries.” The intention is to begin the design and development of the facility during the first quarter of 2025, so there is still a long way to go.

Goals. It is, therefore, a project that seeks to strengthen the clean energy supply chain in the United States, reducing not only the use of diesel systems, but also the dependence on foreign materials. In those first Moment Energy projects reusing batteries, reduced the use of conventional generators by 66%.

The idea is that the Taylor Gigafactory will have an annual production capacity of 1 GHw once it is at full capacity and, in addition, the creation of both 50 jobs during manufacturing and another 200 new permanent jobs. In addition, they hope to be able to reuse all EV batteries that are retired by 2030.

Cost reduction. Apart from being able to give a second life to a battery that still has a way to go, actions like this imply great cost savings. As they point From Canary Media, the company estimates that containers of used batteries that are still in good condition can provide energy storage at a cost 30% less than an equivalent set of batteries, but new.

recycling. There is still no specific date for the Gigafactory to begin operating, but apart from the reuse of these batteries, there are a series of companies that are working closely with vehicle companies to be able to recycle the already spent units. As we read In The Progress Playbook, companies such as Redwood Materials have partnered with the BMW group (and all its brands) to recycle lithium-ion batteries.

Redwood has a recycling system that requires 80% less water and produces 70% fewer emissions. The goal is to recover most of the key minerals from these batteries and thus mitigate the need for new lithium. The process is not easy and it is expensive, and in Europe we have companies like Northvolt that have already proven than the production of batteries with 100% recycled nickel, manganese and cobalt.

The problem is that Northvolt is not exactly there to rave about right now. On the sidelines, movements like Moment Energy’s can lead the way to unite even more industries such as energy and automobiles, since they seem condemned to come to terms with this transition to electric vehicles.

Images | Moment Energy, Tennen-Gas

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