Sustainability
Maintaining environmental integrity is paramount to our battery recycling facility The application of world-leading technologies and the use of state-of-the-art environmental practice will ensure a minimal impact on the neighbourhood and to the surrounding environment. All environmental compliance requirements will be strictly adhered to.
Air emissions
ULAB feeding, breaking and processing will occur in a fully enclosed negative pressure environment. All air emission sources will be vented into a central exhaust ducting system, which will pass through various pollution control stages such as desulfurisation, scrubbing and baghouse dust collection, with the resultant cleaned gases emitted via a main stack.
Water
Water is required onsite for processes such as crushing, desulphurisation, dedusting and gas cooling. There will be no water outlet to the outside. The wastewater from the process and stormwater from the plant's surrounding area are all collected and treated into reclaimed water, and then return to the plant for reuse.
Waste
Lead slag is the main hazardous (or prescribed industrial) waste. Lead levels in the proposed plant’s slag (0.2 – 0.56%) will be an order of magnitude lower than slags produced from lead recyclers in the USA and Europe and combined with relatively low leachable test results suggest the slag from the plant would be classified as Category B prescribed industrial waste in Victoria. This material will be managed in the appropriate hazardous waste landfill.
A monitoring program will be implemented to ensure the environmental performance of the proposed facility, and contingency plans with appropriate responses and corrective actions will form part of the site's Operational Environmental Management Plan (OEMP).
Such monitoring will include Continuous Emissions Monitoring Systems (CEMS), best practices in emissions control, and such monitoring will be linked to warnings, alarms and corresponding internal procedures for plant operational changes or shutdowns, in response to unusual (real time) monitoring data. This will ensure continuous control of plant emissions to the air environment.