alt Hacker News> aluminum is recycled... but because recycling is less energy intensive then production of fresh aluminum
So what?
> Recycling of EV batteries will lose between 1-10% of the valuable metals
How much gasoline, coal, and natural gas can you recycle?
> The worst kind of recycling is decreasing the costs of recycling by outsourcing to third world countries
That's going to happen as long as those countries are poor. They need to develop their economies quickly to demand better laws. Climate change will be a danger for many of them in the coming years.
Better, less-polluting recycling tech will help them far more than continuing to burn fossil fuels.
I just wanted to show that there no such thing as perfect recycling technology.
If you want to choose least material intensive source of energy, you choose nuclear energy. By choosing nuclear energy you get the benefit of almost decarbonizing you electricity production as can be seen in France.