Several industry leaders urged Congress to pass legislation supporting domestic critical mineral recovery and recycling during a recent Capitol Hill hearing.
The hearing before the House Committee on Energy’s Subcommittee on Environment was meant to brief legislators on domestic mineral use for infrastructure, industry and consumer electronics. Witnesses advocated for bills pertaining to battery recycling and mineral recovery, and explained how the federal government could bolster private efforts to shore up critical mineral supply chains.
A common theme was the US overreliance on foreign minerals. David Klanecky, president and CEO of Cirba Solutions, said China controls 70%-90% of global critical mineral processing, including materials used for defense, energy storage and data centers. Processing end-of-life batteries domestically would bolster the nation’s ability to compete on the global marketplace and create jobs, he said.
“Allowing, and in certain cases incentivizing, the export of end-of-life batteries and gigafactory scrap, particularly when we have capable processing capacity, is not just an economic vulnerability. It’s a national security crisis,” said Klanecky, whose Charlotte-based company is one of North America’s largest battery recyclers. “Advancing these markets is essential to ensuring US resilience, safeguarding national security and maintaining strategic leadership on the global stage.”
That process begins with boosting domestic capabilities, according to the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), which provided a written statement to the committee. The US is 100% reliant upon foreign supply for 13 critical minerals and more than 50% reliant on 20 more, in part due to a gradual industrial strategy in China that’s built up that country’s infrastructure.
“America requires bold and strategic action to reset this dynamic,” said the NAM statement, which was signed by Mike David, senior director of energy and resources policy, and Christopher Phalen, vice president of domestic supply. “Policymakers must facilitate the resources manufacturers need to launch projects, streamline the processes to put shovels in the ground through permitting reform, and invest in a pipeline of skilled workers to benefit local economies and ensure the long-term growth of the industry.”
The necessary resources exist domestically, according to Dr. Jessica Dunn, part of the Union of Concerned Scientists. The work she and fellow scientists have done indicates that up to half of the future lithium, cobalt and nickel demand for electric vehicles can be met with US-based recycled content by 2050.
Legislators at the federal level and otherwise can help, she said. Extended producer responsibility (EPR) laws, for example, can centralize battery collection, which is so dispersed now that collection costs can exceed the revenue made from recovery, she said.
“Creating an efficient battery collection network will decrease transportation costs, increase feedstock to recyclers and increase the critical mineral supply for future manufacturing needs,” she said. With EPR laws, “the producer factors in the cost of recycling in the design process,” incentivizing design for disassembly and further bolstering recycling capabilities.
Legislators could enact minimum mineral recovery thresholds similar to the European Union, where recyclers will have to extract 50% of all lithium and 90% of all cobalt, nickel and copper as of 2027. Combined with tax incentives and minimum thresholds for recycled content in new products, this could reinforce existing markets and open up new ones, Dunn said.
Those include abandoned uranium mine waste, which contains minerals that can be retrieved during site cleanup. Greyson Buckingham, co-founder and president of DISA Technologies, said his company’s HPSA technology can do just that, recovering minerals while removing up to 98% of a site’s uranium contamination and reducing waste disposal volume by up to 83%.
“We are not asking you to choose between cleanup and recovery,” he said. “With the right framework, America can do both — protect public health, restore the land and strengthen our mineral supply.”
Testimony was provided in support of the following bills:
- Battery Recycling for America’s Competitive Economy Act, which would set standards for lithium-ion battery waste to enhance recycling efforts
- Coordinating and Harnessing America’s Recovery of Materials Act, which would create a national critical mineral recovery strategy
- Environmental Monitoring and Remediation Technology Assessment Initiative Authorization Act, which would require the EPA to evaluate and support processes to identify and recover minerals from contaminated sources
- Streamlining Critical Mineral Permitting Act, which would expedite the permit process for storage, treatment or disposal of hazardous waste
- Legacy Mine Cleanup Act, which would establish an office to coordinate cleanup of covered mine sites
- Securing America’s Mineral Supply Act, which would make formal law out of previous executive orders relating to critical mineral production and the domestic supply chain
- Spent Petroleum Catalyst Recycling and Critical Minerals and Metals Recovery Exemption Act, which would loosen regulations relating to retrieving metals from hydrotreating and hydrorefining equipment
