Robotic disassembly of electric vehicle batteries: an overview

Abstract

Electric vehicle (EV) batteries reach the end of their service lives in 5-8 years. The repair, remanufacturing and recycling of EV batteries can have significant economic and environmental impacts. Disassembly, a key process in repair, remanufacturing recycling, is usually a manual task. Due to the growing number of end-of-life EV batteries, robots have been proposed to be used in EV battery disassembly. Nevertheless, the high-level complexity and uncertainty in disassembly actions make it difficult to automate EV battery disassembly. This paper gives an overview of the current approaches adopted in EV battery disassembly, and robotic techniques that have the potential to be employed in battery disassembly. We propose a classification of EV battery disassembly actions and identify key future research and innovation directions.