Well right now most Teslas go to salvage by a third party and some go to Tesla recycling. I assume some number just go to normal scrapyards.
It's profitable to recycle the batteries so it isn't really a problem, and isn't likely to be a problem, and there are existing paths to recycle vehicles at EOL. For instance 90% of lead-acid batteries are recycled[1]. Again though batteries are most useful simply as salvage, and it'll probably be that way for a couple decades at least. The battery in a Tesla is so sturdily built (very thick aluminum sidewalls and bottom plate, then filled with potting epoxy) that they pretty easily survive crashes that total the car. Even "dead" batteries still have significant life and storage left, and are still more efficient, cost-effective and energy-dense than ni-cad or lead acid. Right now they're mostly just used by hobbyists but I will not be surprised to see companies popping up in a few years that buy old Teslas for $5,000-$10,000 and sell stationary storage at close to $125-150/kWh. They scrap out the rest of the car, install the battery modules into racks and sell them. At those prices it will take quite a while for this to be a viable business, but once it is it'll even compete with the used car market.
Worst case Tesla batteries can be safely sent to a landfill (they contain a small amount of cobalt and nickel, but no other toxic elements), they should just be drained first. Recycling is done with a hammer mill normally, but car shredders are built to chew through two foot long cast iron blocks[2]. They would have zero trouble with a Tesla, and probably wouldn't mind if it was charged.
My favorite anecdote I heard was that Nissan was blaming the slow development of their PowerWall-esque project for secondary battery usage on how demand for used EV car batteries currently far outstrips supply (because batteries are staying on the road longer than some early Nissan projections).
Interesting, thanks for the detailed response and the links.
I guess I imagined recycling lithium-ion was somehow problematic compared to lead-acid batteries. There's actually company called Toxco that has been specializing in recycling lithium-ion batteries for the last 25 years. They recently received from funding from the DOE to develop infrastructure for recycling EV vehicle batteries:
Fun fact about li ion batteries: The lithium content of an 18650 cell is just under 2% by mass. The lithium content of (evaporated) brine is higher than that! Even the lithium content of rocky lithium ore (spodumene) is around 1.35%. Right now extracting lithium from batteries is more difficult than mining it in the first place! It's just way too easy to extract, so lithium accounts for less than 1% of the price (haven't checked that lately, but it's been true even through large price surges). Hell, the total material inputs for an li-ion battery are something like $20/kWh including electricity and fuel. The price almost totally comes down to the scale and efficiency of manufacturing.
Hopefully this changes but right now the lithium containing fraction of recycled cells is just used as filler material- concrete aggregate etc. Gravel, basically. Crazy.
It's profitable to recycle the batteries so it isn't really a problem, and isn't likely to be a problem, and there are existing paths to recycle vehicles at EOL. For instance 90% of lead-acid batteries are recycled[1]. Again though batteries are most useful simply as salvage, and it'll probably be that way for a couple decades at least. The battery in a Tesla is so sturdily built (very thick aluminum sidewalls and bottom plate, then filled with potting epoxy) that they pretty easily survive crashes that total the car. Even "dead" batteries still have significant life and storage left, and are still more efficient, cost-effective and energy-dense than ni-cad or lead acid. Right now they're mostly just used by hobbyists but I will not be surprised to see companies popping up in a few years that buy old Teslas for $5,000-$10,000 and sell stationary storage at close to $125-150/kWh. They scrap out the rest of the car, install the battery modules into racks and sell them. At those prices it will take quite a while for this to be a viable business, but once it is it'll even compete with the used car market.
Worst case Tesla batteries can be safely sent to a landfill (they contain a small amount of cobalt and nickel, but no other toxic elements), they should just be drained first. Recycling is done with a hammer mill normally, but car shredders are built to chew through two foot long cast iron blocks[2]. They would have zero trouble with a Tesla, and probably wouldn't mind if it was charged.
[1] https://www.tesla.com/blog/teslas-closed-loop-battery-recycl...
[2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQNttxaG1qA