After Mercedes-Benz, BMW also wants to recycle batteries in its own facility

Circular economy in battery production After Mercedes-Benz, BMW also wants to recycle batteries in its own facility

2024-12-16 By Susanne Braun | Translated by AI 2 min Reading Time

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From summer 2025, automaker BMW plans to establish a so-called competence center for battery cell recycling in Kirchroth, Lower Bavaria, thus following in the footsteps of competitor Mercedes-Benz, which recycles in Kuppenheim (Germany). BMW also aims to adopt more environmentally friendly processes. Good move!

From the second half of 2025, the BMW Group, together with partner Encory, plans to recycle used battery cells and waste generated in battery cell production.(Image: BMW Group) — From the second half of 2025, the BMW Group, together with partner Encory, plans to recycle used battery cells and waste generated in battery cell production.
(Image: BMW Group)

When automaker Mercedes-Benz announced the opening of a battery recycling factory in Kuppenheim, Baden-Württemberg (Germany), in October 2024, many hoped that competitors in the automotive industry would follow suit. The extraction of resources for battery production is laborious, costly, and often an environmental disaster. Additionally, according to Mercedes-Benz officials, the company expects a recovery rate of over 90 percent from its own facility, which comes quite close to a true circular economy.

Apparently, BMW also sees the potential for recycling used battery cells and leftover materials from battery cell production to reuse the recovered materials for pilot battery cell manufacturing. Starting in the second half of 2025, as announced by BMW Group officials, a Cell Recycling Competence Center (CRCC) will be established and set up in Kirchroth (Germany), Lower Bavaria, in the Straubing-Bogen district. The cost is around 10.7 million US dollars. The applied recycling processes focus on mechanical methods.

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Direct recycling as a cost-saving factor

Lithium, cobalt, graphite, manganese, nickel, and copper are among the largest cost factors in battery cell production. "The responsible handling of cell raw materials is necessary from both an ecological and economic perspective," the BMW Group states. Accordingly, they have developed a direct recycling process that does not revert the raw materials from the battery cells to their original state but returns them "directly" to the cell manufacturing cycle.

In the competence centers in Munich and Parsdorf (Germany), mechanical recycling processes have been designed that do without the previously customary energy-intensive recycling processes from the chemical and thermal sectors. The developed processes are then to be applied on a larger scale in the BMW Group's CRCC to recycle battery cell material in the mid-double-digit ton range annually.

The location in Kirchroth was chosen because it is in close proximity to the Parsdorf Cell Manufacturing Competence Center (CMCC) and the Munich Battery Cell Competence Center (BCCC). This keeps the distances short, for example, to transport recyclate from the CRCC to the CMCC. BMW holds a 50 percent stake in the Cell Recycling Competence Center, with the other half belonging to the partner Encory GmbH, which will build and operate the center. (sb)

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Date: 08.12.2025

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