McKinsey expects the emergent market for second-life batteries to offer something like 200 gigawatt-hours of storage capacity by 2030. Most of the second-life batteries with sufficient residual capacity to be used for local electricity storage will come from the USA, Europe and China, each accounting for around one third of the supply. Certain challenges are already apparent: differences in shapes and electrodes (because the batteries come from 15 different manufacturers), the lack of quality standards and market regulations for second-life batteries, and so on. The expected decline in new battery prices adds further uncertainty.

Written by Tobias Beau