Battery prices should come down by 10% after Budget 2025: Attero Recycling CEO

The freshly announced Union Budget 2025 leaves a lot to unpack, particularly with regards to just how a custom duty waiver on critical mineral scrappage is to help boost EV battery manufacturing. Here are a few

Comparing the two: Lower import duty on refined critical minerals vs scrapped critical minerals.

Last year’s budget had announced that the import duty on critical minerals required for battery manufacturing will be waived off. While this was a push in the right direction, according to Attero Recycling CEO Nitin Gupta, the policy of waiving BCD (Basic Customs Duty) on the scrapping of said critical minerals is better as the import value of scrap is lesser than refined lithium. It also gives a boost to India’s refining and recycling capabilities which will have to be upscaled at record pace in light of the new policies.

“It essentially lessens the import requirement. It’s a value addition in the supply chain. If you’re creating a refining infrastructure and capacity in the country, then the value addition from scrap to finished product is happening in the country. It is relatively more domestic in nature. It’s not 100% domestic, in that it’s still dependent on import, but the value of the import goes down overall” says Gupta.

Will these policies help set-up a more robust refining ecosystem?

Even if India were to have sizable lithium reserves (which it doesn’t) it cannot hope to have a resource independent EV ecosystem without having its own battery material refining ecosystem. At present 80% of EV battery refining happens in China. Are these policies going to be enough to boost lithium and cobalt refineries in India.

“That’s our read of it” says Gupta. “It gives supply security, reduces the input cost and basically encourages more investment in refining of critical minerals in the country”. “Attero is a leader in this space and I’m sure other players will also commit to the field of setting-up refining infrastructure and capacity in India”

Will recycling companies play a critical role in refining lithium and cobalt?

The fact remains that even though players like Attero and BatX are prominent ones in the EV battery and electronic waste recycling space, India’s mineral refining ecosystem remains woefully inadequate. Gupta however states that Attero’s facility already includes refining.

“Having an in-house refining facility, you’re taking that to stage two and producing pure output”. So for refining, we can either take refined battery output or we can import the scrap directly” says Gupta, who will now be incentivised to import greater quantities of scrap.

At present, India has little to no manufacturing waste as companies are yet to scale-up battery cell manufacturing efforts. “Importing actually gives a boost to our capacity which we can now increase significantly, thanks to the lower cost of imported waste”

Is this policy and the Clean Tech mission bringing domestic value addition to EV batteries likely to improve significantly?

There’s already a PLI scheme for battery manufacturing. Now if you’re buying refined lithium carbonate domestically, you’re meeting some value addition criteria. The Clean Tech mission is about accelerating various green technologies, so these will all accelerate manufacturing of EV batteries.

Can this bring down prices of EV batteries, and therefore EVs?

In its second year, the PM e-Drive scheme only provides incentives up to ₹5000 for electric-two wheelers – half of the incentive cap offered last year, which already saw a slowdown in demand. While it’s optimistic to assume that the drop in battery prices resulting from the BCD waiver will offset the absence of incentives, Gupta attests that battery prices will come down by 10%. “Battery prices will come down by 10% and since batteries are roughly 50% of the overall cost of the vehicle, there should be at least a 5% impact.”

How will recycling outfits like Attero expand?

“So the expansion plan was already in place. This will accelerate it” says Gupta. “We’re looking to increase our capacity six times in the next four years. We’re doubling our current capacity from 1.44 lakh tonnes per annum to 300,000 tonnes per annum. This means more recycling plans, more capacity, battery recycling capacity. We are also expanding our copper and aluminium facility. When asked about whether this will lead to the founding of more recycling outfits, Gupta welcomed the idea. “India needs it if we are to outpace China and become a global leader. We need more champions in this space. It’s beneficial for the overall ecosystem.