Newsletter June ‘25
On June 19, the EU Council agreed that companies placing batteries on the European market will get two additional years to implement audited responsible-sourcing programs for key minerals. This extension – part of a broader competitiveness and simplification effort – is designed to ensure firms can comply effectively with the Battery Regulation’s strict reporting standards on social and environmental impacts in the supply chain. Beyond Europe, global coordination on battery sustainability is advancing. The Global Battery Alliance (GBA), a public-private coalition, held its Annual Meeting in Asia and unveiled results from its latest Battery Passport pilot programs. Eleven pilot consortia led by major battery manufacturers (including CATL, Panasonic and Northvolt) successfully tested the collection of harmonized ESG data for batteries. Participants reported indicators such as the carbon footprint per cell, responsible sourcing metrics, and material provenance, aligned with GBA’s “Battery Passport” rulebook. These developments signal growing international alignment on battery transparency – complementing regulatory moves by the EU – and pave the way for more globally standardized battery sustainability reporting by 2030.
Industry Spotlight: Battery Passport Pilots
CATL, the world’s largest EV battery maker, emerged as a leader in the Battery Passport pilot results disclosed in June. The company showcased two battery projects with fully traced supply chains and third-party verified data on their environmental impact. Notably, CATL’s pilot passports documented an average carbon footprint of about 49 kg CO₂-equivalent per kWh for its latest batteries. CATL and its peers worked pre-competitively through the GBA to trial these digital passports, demonstrating how data on raw material origins, renewable energy use, and even biodiversity factors can be shared securely across the value chain. Industry executives hailed the pilot as a milestone – Inga Petersen, GBA’s Executive Director, called it an “unprecedented commitment to greater transparency and sustainability in the battery industry”. With automakers like Mercedes-Benz and Tesla also supportive of such initiatives, the pilot’s success is building confidence that full battery passports will be feasible at scale. Companies are now beginning to integrate learnings from these pilots into their operations, preparing for the EU’s 2027 passport mandate and answering growing consumer demand for proof of responsible battery production.
Circularity & Innovation
June brought major advances in giving used EV batteries a second life. In Europe, Italy’s busiest airport, Rome Fiumicino, inaugurated a 10 MWh energy storage system built from 762 retired electric car battery packs. Developed by utility Enel and airport operator ADR, this is Italy’s largest EV battery-based storage installation. The system, dubbed “Pioneer,” stores solar energy from the airport’s photovoltaic plant and can power the equivalent of 3,000 homes for a day. By redeploying Nissan, Mercedes-Benz, and Stellantis EV batteries that can no longer serve in vehicles, the project will cut an estimated 16,000 tons of CO₂ over ten years. Meanwhile in the United States, recycling firm Redwood Materials launched what it calls the world’s largest second-life battery deployment. The Nevada-based company repurposed hundreds of “depreciated but functional” EV battery modules into a massive 12 MW/63 MWh on-site microgrid to power a 2,000-GPU data center for Crusoe, an AI-focused tech firm. According to Redwood, this upcycled storage system can provide enough energy to support 9,000 households or even charge an EV for a 240,000-mile journey. Both the Enel and Redwood projects highlight the scaling potential of battery reuse: by utilizing batteries that still hold 50-70% of their capacity, these initiatives reduce e-waste, defer recycling, and lower demand for newly mined materials. Companies across the battery value chain – from automakers to energy companies – are increasingly investing in such circular solutions, which complement recycling efforts and improve the overall sustainability profile of electric mobility.
Sources Consulted: Reuters (2025/06/03), Reuters (2025/06/30), Reuters (2025/06/19), BatteryTechOnline (2025/06/24), The Verge (2025/06/27), Reuters (2025/02/13)
