China is the world's largest electric vehicle market, and its fleet is expanding faster than anywhere else. That growth brings a mounting wave of retired batteries, which if mismanaged pose environmental and safety risks. Today, most retired batteries are processed through metallurgical recycling—a well‑established but lower‑value route that extracts metals but forgoes opportunities for reuse in energy storage or direct material regeneration. High‑value pathways offer significantly greater economic returns and deeper emissions cuts, yet they remain underdeveloped. Policy efforts have encouraged this shift, but progress is slow, hampered by logistical barriers, infrastructure gaps, and market inertia. Based on these challenges, or because of these issues, there is a need to conduct in‑depth research on how spatial supply‑demand mismatches constrain the high‑value utilization of retired batteries and what strategies can overcome them.
Researchers from Fudan University in Shanghai report (DOI: 10.1016/j.ese.2026.100754) these findings on 24 August 2026 in the journal Environmental Science and Ecotechnology. Their province‑level integrated model, driven by vehicle‑ and company‑level data, projects the supply, demand, and disposal of retired batteries across China from 2020 to 2050, and evaluates the life‑cycle greenhouse gas emissions and costs under different scenarios.
The analysis shows that scenarios prioritizing high‑value utilization—either direct recycling or storage applications—could deliver cost savings 3‑ to 5‑fold greater than those relying on metallurgical recycling, and emissions reductions 1‑ to 3‑fold larger. Yet the spatial separation between retirement hotspots and demand centers is severe. Retired batteries tend to accumulate in economically developed eastern provinces with high electric vehicle ownership, while demand for storage is concentrated in renewable‑rich western provinces and recycling demand in battery‑manufacturing regions. By 2050, under a scenario that prioritizes storage applications, the Gini coefficient—a measure of spatial inequality—rises from 0.6 to 0.7, indicating growing mismatch. For direct recycling, although the coefficient declines modestly, Guangdong and Fujian alone could face shortages exceeding 3,800 and 4,800 gigawatt‑hours, respectively, while other provinces hold surpluses. Without interprovincial transport, 50‑87 percent of the potential cost savings and 26‑53 percent of emissions reductions would remain unrealized. Crucially, the researchers found that transport adds only minimal cost and emissions—about 2.3 percent of total cost savings and 0.03 percent of total mitigation—making it a highly efficient intervention.
"What surprised us most was the sheer scale of the gap—six billion tons of carbon reductions locked up simply because batteries retire in the wrong places," said the authors. "But the good news is that this is not a technological barrier; it's a logistical and planning challenge. With early, coordinated investment in transport networks and treatment infrastructure, we can turn this spatial mismatch from a liability into a massive opportunity. The cost of moving batteries across provinces is tiny compared to the climate and economic gains we can unlock."
The findings offer a practical roadmap for policymakers and industry. Establishing a streamlined national transport network for retired batteries—currently hampered by complex approval procedures and safety regulations—could dramatically improve efficiency while reducing illegal disposal channels. The optimal strategy identified by the team prioritizes storage applications and direct recycling, gradually phasing out metallurgical recycling after 2030. This approach not only cuts emissions but also secures critical materials: batteries used in storage typically re‑enter the recycling stream within six years, and regenerated batteries can eventually be recycled too. For rapidly electrifying markets like the United States and Europe, which face similar spatial mismatches, the Chinese case provides a transferable model—showing that integrated spatial planning, infrastructure build‑out, and cross‑regional coordination are essential to realizing the full climate and economic promise of the electric vehicle revolution.
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References
DOI
10.1016/j.ese.2026.100754
Original Source URL
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ese.2026.100754
Funding information
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 52022023).
About Environmental Science and Ecotechnology
Environmental Science and Ecotechnology (ISSN 2666-4984) is an international, peer-reviewed, and open-access journal published by Elsevier. The journal publishes significant views and research across the full spectrum of ecology and environmental sciences, such as climate change, sustainability, biodiversity conservation, environment & health, green catalysis/processing for pollution control, and AI-driven environmental engineering. The latest impact factor of ESE is 14.3, according to the Journal Citation ReportsTM 2024.