Recycling Concept for Electric Vehicle Drives in the Context of Rare Earth Recovery

Neodymium Iron Boron (NdFeB) magnets provide the best magnetic properties and are therefore key components for many green technologies. This leads to steeply rising demand for the related rare earth (RE) elements, with e-mobility as central driver. The supply situation for RE magnets is characterized by the dominance of the PR China for the entire value chain causing various problems for the European industry. A potential countermeasure to reduce the dependency on imports is the implementation of a closed raw material cycle within the European Union (EU). Especially the recycling of automotive traction drives provides high potential for the recovery of RE magnets but is complicated by various technical and organizational factors. As result currently no recycling is industrialized for the recovery of RE magnets from traction drives of end-of-life (EOL) electric vehicles (EV).In this context the following paper presents a general concept for the recovery of RE magnets from automotive traction motors. The focus is set on the extraction process of the magnets from the rotor and the related thermal demagnetization step. Finally, the achieved results are evaluated regarding the transferability to a potential series process.